Hello and

the English we speak the podcast where we explain phrases that fluent English speakers use

so that you can use them as well.

I'm Fay Faye and I'm Beth.

How's it going Faye Faye? I'm Beth. How's it going Faye? I'm very well. Thank you Beth

Now the phrase we're going to look at in this program is off the cuff

There are lots of phrases in the English language with clothes words in them that actually

have nothing to do with clothes. And this phrase is one of them. Off the cuff, yes. So a cuff is the end of a shirt sleeve. It might have buttons or you might

need cuff links for it. But off the cuff means that you do or say something with no preparation or very little preparation.

So it's got nothing to do with clothes.

That's right. So I actually have an example for this. In my last class I had at

university my teacher asked me to give a speech to the class like a

reflection. I had no warning and I just set something really short in front of everyone. I can't

actually remember what I said but there was no preparation so I said it off the cuff.

That sounds daunting. So it was completely improvised. You hadn't

planned anything because you didn't know it was going to happen. You probably thanked your

teachers and classmates, that sort of thing. You probably.

Beth have you done anything off the cuff recently?

Let me think so yeah so actually I go to a Spanish class and the other day we suddenly had exam practice.

The teacher didn't give us any time to prepare.

So when I got to my speaking, I just said something off the cuff, I hadn't planned

anything.

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