Treat (someone) to
When you treat someone to something, you give another person something enjoyable, you give a good experience. This isn’t a very common phrasal verb, but it’s a good one to know. Today’s lesson was about Vin Scully , the longtime Dodgers broadcaster. He was in the game from 1950 until 2016, a total of 67 years.
And in those 67 years, he had a chance to meet and get to know a lot of famous players from long ago. He had lots of good stories about players like Willie Mays and Hank Aaron, later Kirk Gibson and others, stories that were never written down, things that were never known about them.
And during the broadcasts of more recent games, Vin Scully would treat listeners to stories about those famous players from long ago. He would treat listeners to stories: he would give the listeners something entertaining.
You’ll want to use “treat someone to” with things that a person can give or pay for. Someone can treat you to the movies. That person would invite you to the movies and buy your ticket. You can treat your friend to dinner: you invite the friend out and pay for the dinner. You can treat your kids to ice cream: you take them out, you pay, you and the kids all enjoy it.
You can even treat yourself to something. We tend to use this for small luxuries. I treated myself to a massage, you might say, or to a day at the spa. Or, I treated myself to front-row seats at the game. You gave yourself, you allowed yourself, a little luxury.
Again, this isn’t very common. I think I covered the basics here. Here are the main categories. You can treat someone to stories. You can treat someone to a shared experience like a meal, coffee, dessert, the movies, tickets to a play, something like that. And you can treat yourself to small luxuries.
Quote of the Week
Today’s quote is from Vin Scully himself. He said, “As long as you live keep smiling because it brightens everybody’s day.” Indeed it does, and he smiled through his voice on the radio and television for over six decades. Wow. “As long as you live keep smiling because it brightens everybody’s day.”
See you next time!
On September 3, JR and I will treat you to a special version of Plain English for lesson number 500. September 3 is a Saturday. We will be doing lesson number 500 live on Facebook and Instagram. You’ll get to see us both on camera, you’ll hear JR, he will have a speaking part in the big 500th lesson.
So you’ll want to save that date, September 3. It will be the morning here, 8:00 a.m. in Chicago, 9:00 a.m. in New York. So that means it’s mid-morning in Brazil, afternoon in Europe, and nighttime in Asia. September 3, don’t forget that date!
You can get all the details at PlainEnglish.com/500. That’s where you can connect with us on Instagram and Facebook so that you can watch the live stream. You can see the exact time. You can add it to your calendar. There are no excuses to miss this. PlainEnglish.com/500.
Use realistic expressions like a native speaker
