We had a Scirocco storm on Friday and ever since then the weather has been cold for Sicily in mid- May. Everyone is still huddled in their padded jackets, no one has made the transition into short-sleeved or sleeveless garments and none of the women is yet tightless. Indeed, I gather it has been warmer in the UK than in Sicily today!
I am glad to be able to report that the rubbish has been collected [for now].
The via Sacro Cuore has been delightfully quiet today as there are roadworks there; at least, I hope it's the road they are dealing with. Someone said they are working on the water system and that idea fills me with horror, lest "modernisation" render the system even less reliable than it is now. Talking of water, we had a delivery on Saturday morning and clever Simi now not only knows when the truck is on its way from the main road, but whether or not it is bound for our condominio! [She has a "special" bark for each case.]
A student came in this evening wanting an "emergency lesson" to help him prepare for a test tomorrow. "I have to study a tense.. quello con [the one with] had.. or maybe it's quello con have", said he, helpfully. As the former could be any of 4 and the latter any of 8, I was a little perplexed, reader. Then I decided that it was unlikely that he would be tested on the English perfect tense if he had not yet been tested on the present perfect, so that's what I plumped for. I hope his regular teacher at day school doesn't have too bad a time day to day, that she has had a rest tonight and had had a rest before that. I also hope that she has not been working too hard recently and had not been doing so prior to that period. I trust that she will have finished her marking by tomorrow and that she will not have been finding it too hard. If I had known exactly which tense was needed today I would have done a better job. I hope the lady has been comforted if she has read this, that she has been reading it as a light article, as was intended and that she will have had a laugh by now. She won't have been offended, will she? Auguri, fellow-professoressa!
So come on, CAE students of mine: which tense is which, then?!
19 comments:
The weather has been very warm her actually. I think I might plug the fan in tonight.
I like the idea of Simi having different barks for different actions of the truck. I can believe it, actually.
I'm just thinking about how to translate your final para into Italian. Aargh!
I am absolutely baffled by the tenses - which one is future pluperfect and which one is conditional past?
Hi WL...I have just read the piece about the student..I have re-read and even I am having problems :-)...
The weather has been very warm in the UK for the time of the year. I was only thinking the other evening whether the weather had been warm this time last year. I concluded that it had been warm but then the rot set in. This is because the weather was so wet last June and July; in fact, I cannot recall the weather having been so inclement at that time of year. Not in my lifetime.
Then I remembered the summer holidays that had been very wet. I pictured the seaside holidays when I had had to wear my plastic raincoat instead of my swimming costume. Probably just as well since my mother had knitted my costume from a pattern she had had in a magazine.
Hope the student does well, WL!
Talking of Siroccos I found some old pictures of Malta the other day... how incredibly dry it is! Have you ever been there? To me Malta is a North African island, not a European one... it's way dryer than I remember southern Spain or even most of Morocco being... the countryside is literally just brown earth with cactuses poking out (unless specially irrigated) it's not scrubby or bushy like most of southern Europe seems to be...
hi I'm back sorry couldn't really post last week as was in want of internet connexion!
Oh, good heavens, Welshcakes -
This post is a memento mori if ever there were one.
Once upon a time, long ago and far away, I could have named each of the tenses in your post with ease. Alas...
Hi, Crushed. Cold [22 C] and rainy here! Simi says she is glad you appreciate her cleverness. Aargh indeed, WW! Right, Mutley: what in most Latin-based langs is called the pluperfect is in fact the perfect in English and the perfect in the other langs is the English present perfect. So future perfect is "will have + past participle" . Third conditional is "If + subj + had + past participle + subj + would have + past part." But there are many variations, of course. I never , ever tell a student that "This is the case 100 % of the time" otherwise they want to kill you when they find variations! Sorry, Anne! Well done and thanks, Book Owl. I'll direct my students to your comment, too! Glad you're back, Gleds and you seem on fine form over there. Yes, have been to Malta but about 10 years ago and I gather it is much changed. I rather liked it, actually.
Sorry about that, Ludlingtonian! There comes a point in language study when you can no longer get away with not knowing your tenses and believe me, I have been through the "Let's ignore them" philosophy of language teaching. I may post on this.
22C is not cold in my opinion. We are still suffering from a cold May ( 10C today) and gardening is on hold as I am a fair weather gardener.
Just goes to show you are pretty good at winging it.
Oh, had had, those two together always sounded so wrong. My sis is an English Major/Masters Deg. and I'm sure I've shamed her on many an occasion...
In talking with some of my grammar school friends(yes, we still talk regularly)we all thought our English teachers taught us very little in comparison to schools in the area...let alone the country...
I'm so glad I don't have to learn English as a foreign language! I was good at this stuff when I was in school, and parsing a sentence held no fears for me. How times change!
It was incredibly warm in the UK on Monday.
I did wonder how your weather was in Sicily. Lovely to hear about Simi again and I hope the student did well in his test.
Hi, jmb. Well, it's cold for Sicily at this time of year! Hi, pink. Nice that you still talk to your schoolfriends and what you say about your English teachers is interesting. Hi, dragonstar. Yes, we move on and forget! Ciao, cherrypie. So I gather - cold for the season here.
I was smiling as I read through this post and then had to have a good chuckle about all the tenses. Having taught French in high school, you have given me the best laugh today! I have been cheered up immensely! LOL
Hi, Ellee. We haven't heard how the student did yet. Hi, Leslie. Thnk you and yes, your comment HAS GIVEN me a good laugh, too!
You ladies of the teaching fraternity make me feel a little like a 'thicko' at times.
Suppose that's why you are so good at what you do.
I believe that the French love the subjunctive and it took me to get to level 5 to get my head around it.
After taking a year off, re health issues, I shall probably be back to level 2.
Just to think Welshcakes, I nearly enrolled on an Italian Course too!
Hope you and Darling Simi are well and not working too hard.
It really makes me laugh when you talk about Simi, shouting at the Water Truck, so funny!
The sun still shines and all is well, here in Liverpool.
Lots of cultural things going on, as Liverpool is The Capital of Culture 2008.
We've got a wonderful new Shopping Precinct in the process of construction, and on 29th May 08, John Lewis is opening a fantastic new store.
Unbelievably the Project is 'bang on target' for the completion date.
So well done Liverpool say I!
Di.xxx
Trubes, you are certainly no "thicko"! Look at Trubes's witty posts, people! Yes, the French, the Itals and the Spanish love the subjunctive and I must admit I miss it myself in English [but that's just me]. Yes, well done Liverpool!
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