Imagine that

Imagine that

When did we do “buyer beware “? Was that last week? I think that was last week, last Thursday. Buyer beware was one of those phrases that you don’t work into a sentence, you just kind of put it in between sentences.

Today’s expression is similar. It’s “imagine that.” You just throw this expression out there. It doesn’t belong in a sentence. You just say it in between sentences, when you feel it .

“Imagine that” is a way to express surprise or disbelief at a situation. It’s very informal. It’s not very common, but it works in some specific situations.

In today’s lesson about South Korea, I was describing the different ways to calculate your age . In South Korea, I explained , the day a baby is born, that baby is one year old. Your first day on this Earth, I said, and you’re already one year old. Imagine that!

I’m expressing surprise or disbelief. Why? Well, according to the international standard, if you want to be age 1, you have to earn it. You have to get through that first year. And that’s not an easy year, either. You spend most of it crying . If you haven’t lived one full year, 365 days, or sometimes 366 days, if you haven’t done that yet, you can’t call yourself one year old.

But in South Korea, you get to be one year old just for coming out of the womb ! Imagine that. Surprise, disbelief.

It was a complete coincidence that this lesson about birthdays is coming out on my birthday. I swear! First of all, we only have episodes twice a week, so not every year has an episode on my birthday. I already wrote the episode about Russia, which meant that the birthday lesson would be Thursday. And I didn’t honestly know what day this would come out until I set up the files this week and saw Thursday would be July 20. So—imagine that—the lesson about Korean birthdays would come out on my birthday. Imagine that—just a general expression of surprise.

This is often used sarcastically . You can say “Imagine that” if you want to sound surprised, when you’re not really surprised.

I had a colleague who would always call in sick on a Friday. He didn’t try very hard to disguise it , either, like he never called in sick on a Wednesday. Every Friday, working from home, not feeling well. Sometimes we would forget it was Friday and we’d try to get in touch with him . We’ll call him Oliver. (Not his real name—thank you ChatGPT.)

I might be in a meeting and I might say, “Is Oliver at his desk? Let’s see where he is on his part of the problem.” And someone would say, “Oh, Oliver isn’t here.” And I might be tempted to say, “Ah, it’s Friday and Oliver’s out sick . Imagine that!”

That’s expressing mock surprise —I wasn’t really surprised, but I used “imagine that” as a way of expressing sarcastic surprise. Imagine that, he’s not here on a Friday. I tried not to be sarcastic in professional situations like that, but sometimes it was impossible!

JR’s song of the week

JR! What a guy. He let me pick the song of the week on my birthday. So as the special guest song picker for today, and today only, I’m picking “Golden Heart” by Mark Knopfler. You might not know that name, but you might know the band Dire Straits. Mark Knopfler was the lead singer for Dire Straits. They were one of the most commercially successful bands of the 1980s and 1990s. After the band broke up , Knopfler took a few years off and then released a solo album in 1996.

In the song’s lyrics , the golden heart was on a necklace a girl was wearing. And the singer meets her—I think just once—but she makes an impression on him. She gives him the pendant and he keeps it as a reminder of the time they met.

“Golden Heart” by Mark Knopfler is the song of the week. Thank you, JR, for letting me pick this week.

See you next time!

And that’s all for today’s Plain English, lesson number 591. If you’re looking for the transcripts, just go to PlainEnglish.com/591. The transcript is in two pieces—the main story and the expression are on different pages. But the full transcript is there, PlainEnglish.com/591.

Have a great weekend. I’ll see you right back here on Monday.