Speaker 1: Do you remember the last song you listened to? When
was that last night? And how long did it last?
I'll bet this is the last thing you thought i'd
ask you. Well, at last, we're going to get this
English lesson off the ground.
Speaker 2: Welcome to another Happy English podcast, coming to you from
New York City. And here's your English teacher, Michael.
Speaker 1: All right, thank you John, and thanks everyone. It's Michael
here from Happy English and I help people speak English better.
This is Happy English Podcast, Episode eight twenty nine. How
we use Last? Hello and welcome. Thanks for joining me
for another episode of the Happy English Podcast. I'm your
English teacher Michael, and I'm glad you're here for today's
podcast English lesson. We're going to talk about a really
small word that's used in a lot of big ways. Last.
This word pops up all the time in English, and
it's not just for talking about the final thing. There's
actually a handful of common ways to use last, and
today we're going to explore five of them with natural
examples and stories. As we usually do here, Let's start
with the most common use last as an adjective. You
probably already know this one. We use last to mean
the final one, in a group or in a sequence,
like even though I worked late, I was able to
catch the last bus home. And you know what. Here
in Japan the public transportation system is great, but unlike
New York, the last train is around midnight. Miss that,
and good luck getting back home. Here's one more. At
the wedding, they played the last dance by ten thirty
and then everyone went home. So anytime you want to
talk about the final something, a meeting, a class, a cookie,
last is your word. All right, Now, here's the next one.
We also use last to talk about time, specifically a
time in the past, you know, like last week, last night,
or last summer. We use last followed by a time
word to talk about when something happened. Last followed by
a time word means the one before now, like I
had dinner with my sister last Sunday, or I haven't
seen Steve since last April. Here's another example. Even though
I bought that cologne last year, there's still some left
in the bottle. That stuff lasts forever. Hey, And speaking
of lasting, here comes our third usage. Did you catch it? Yep?
We use last as a verb. When we say something lasts,
we mean it continues. Or exists for a certain period
of time, like the CEO's speech lasted for almost two hours.
Everyone who was falling asleep. And you know what, a
big jar of mayo doesn't last long. In my house,
we use it on everything. Hey, by the way, did
you catch my pronunciation of mayo? You know, mayonnaise. It's mayo,
like the month of May. Last month, mayo mayo. Okay,
one more. My friend just bought a new car and
asked me how long does a tank of gas last
in your suv? And I said, ah, not long enough.
Now here's a fun one you might hear in movies
or when someone's super relieved. At last, that's a phrase
we used to mean finally, usually after waiting a long time,
like Mick lost his job two years ago, but at
last he finally found something new. And you know, but
I've been searching for a good coffee shop in this
neighborhood and at last I found one that makes really
good coffee. Yeah, at last, we can move on to
the last one. And this one's really useful. We often
say that someone or something is the last person or
the last thing we expected. It means we're really surprised,
like when one of my buddies dragged me to a
football game. We met up with another friend who when
he saw me said, Wow, you're the last person I
expected to see here. What a surprise. Believe me, I
was surprised too. And then last week and my cousin
was trying to talk to me about her investment strategies.
She's the last one who should be giving advice about money.
She's always broke. So what's the last thing you remember
learning in English? Hopefully it was fun and hopefully this
will stick with you too. By the way, the best
way to remember English like this and any other word
or phrase in English, is to take that word or phrase,
write it in a sentence that's true for you or
true in your world, and then memorize your sentences. And
did you know You can get more practice using your
English when you join my podcast Learner's Study Group. There
you can make new friends, join us for live group
lessons every week where we practice these podcast lessons together.
Plus you get access to the pdf, transcript and audio
download for every Happy English podcast in the past and
in the future. And on top of that, each episode
has exercises where you can practice this English point with
speaking and writing checked by me. To learn more, we'll
just visit Myhappy English dot com and choose podcast lesson
eight twenty nine. Remember, learning another language is not easy,
but it's not impossible, and I'm here to help you
on your journey.
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visit Myhappy english dot com. Show your support for Happy
English by leaving us a review. Get English, Get happy,
Happy English.