Kick in
Today’s expression is a great phrasal verb. You are going to sound like a real native English speaker if you start using this one. To kick in. To kick in means “to take effect” or “to become effective.” Caffeine takes about 30 minutes to kick in after you drink a cup of coffee. That means you don’t feel it until after about 30 minutes. It takes 30 minutes to kick in.
It’s common with many types of drugs, right? If you have a headache and you take Advil or Tylenol or whatever, it usually takes a little while to kick in. It doesn’t kick in until about 20 minutes after you take it, right?
It’s common to say something “kicks in right away” or doesn’t kick in right away. That means, it becomes effective immediately. We’ve talked about legalizing cannabis. One of the problems with edibles—food products with cannabis—is that the effects don’t kick in right away. So that leads some people to consume edibles, think they’re not having an effect, and then eat some more. Little do they realize, the effects start to kick in after a few minutes—and they realize they’ve had too much only when it’s too late. That’s one of the dangers of cannabis edibles.
What does kick in right away? Alcohol does. If you drink a beer or glass of wine over the course of a half-hour, you don’t say it “kicks in right away.” But if you take a shot of tequila, you feel the effects immediately. You would say it kicks in right away.
We were talking about Japan. They have a consumption tax in Japan, like a national sales tax. It is currently 8 percent, but it’s scheduled to go up to 10 percent on October 1. The new tax rate kicks in just a few days from now. New rules can kick in. Here in the US, the national government is changing the ID regulations for boarding airplanes. So most of us have to get new state identification cards before the new regulations kick in. That’s going to be in October 2020. The new regulations kick in about a year from now. So if you’re in the US, you’ll need to use either your passport or a new, higher-security ID card.
Quote of the week
Time for the quote of the week today, it’s about sleep. The Roman poet Ovid wrote in the first century AD—this is an old one—here’s what he said: “There is more refreshment and stimulation in a nap, even of the briefest, than in all the alcohol ever distilled.” So even the slightest, quickest nap—even an inemuri—would give you more refreshment than any type of drink. That’s our quote of the week, “There is more refreshment and stimulation in a nap, even of the briefest, than in all the alcohol ever distilled.”
That’s all for today. Thanks for being with us again. If you have any daytime napping strategies to share with your fellow listeners, write them in the comments of this episode at PlainEnglish.com/194. If we get some good comments, I’ll read a few of them on a future episode.
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See you on Thursday!
Use realistic expressions like a native speaker
