A matter of time
It’s only a matter of time. Have you heard that expression before? You say that when you know something is going to happen—you just don’t know when. It’s for sure; it’s definitely going to happen. The only question is when. It’s only a matter of time.
A lot of people think it’s only a matter of time before the NBA expands to Mexico City. They think the reasons to go there are so strong. It’s a huge market. They have a nice arena. Mexicans love basketball. TV networks like paying for the rights to American basketball. And it’s close enough that visiting teams can get there easily. The commissioner of the league has said complimentary things about the games down there. Some people are so sure that there will be an NBA team in Mexico, they say it’s just a matter of time. I’m not 100 percent sure I agree with them; I think it’s definitely possible, but I’m not quite as sure as others are.
When you use “it’s only a matter of time,” you usually say the word “before” after it. So for example, it’s only a matter of time before stocks start to go down. Global stocks have been doing pretty well the last eight or nine years; after going up for so long, it’s only a matter of time before they go down again, as in fact they have started to do the last few months.
Have you ever seen someone drive unsafely? You might say, it’s only a matter of time before he causes an accident since he always texts when he drives. That’s not safe to be texting and driving, right? It’s only a matter of time before something bad happens.
You can use it in the past tense, too. When something has happened, and you want to say that you knew it was going to happen, you just didn’t know when, you can say, “Well, it was only a matter of time.” One of the stories I read this week was about Carnival Cruise Lines. They’re building a cruise ship with a roller coaster on it. I’m not even joking about this; the ship is called the Mardi Gras, and it’s going to debut in 2020. The big cruise ship companies have been competing to see who can put the most outrageous amenities on board. One company has a go-kart track; another has a 10-story—not ten-foot, ten-story-high water slide. And now there will be a roller coaster on a cruise ship. I guess it was only a matter of time, right? They keep getting crazier and crazier. A roller coaster. I get motion sickness, so if I got on a roller coaster, which is bad enough, but if I got on a roller coaster on a boat…well, it would only be a matter of time before I got sick. So I’ll be staying off that cruise ship; that much I know for sure.
That’s all for today’s episode. Remember—if you like listening to English, think how much you’ll enjoy speaking English after you learn the secrets to speaking with more confidence. That’s what you’ll get by trying the pronunciation course at MosaLingua. You can check that out at PlainEnglish.com/talk. And happy new year! Please celebrate safely tonight. Everything in moderation, right? 2019 is right around the corner. We can’t know what the future holds, but you can count on JR and me to be right here with you at Plain English every Monday and every Thursday—and every now and then for a special episode.
Thanks so much for being with us. Happy New Year—we’ll be back together again on January 3, 2019.
Use realistic expressions like a native speaker
