Happy Campers – exercise 2 – answers and notes

1 Precious
2 The weekly grind.
Grind – hard, dull work – we speak of the daily grind, the yearly grind. We use the verb ‘to grind away‘ to mean work or study hard – "He’s grinding away at the office."
3 The antidote to
An antidote is 1) a medical remedy taken to counteract a particular drug or poison – eg The man who was bitten by a snake had to be taken to hospital for an antidote (to the snake venom). 2) something that counteracts an unpleasant feeling or situation eg After all the recent bad news we went out for an evening’s fun as an antidote.
4 The stresses and strains.
5 Does not do (something / someone) justice.
The writer says ‘disappointment’ does not do justice to the feelings of frustration and anger (they felt is omitted).
6 Unfortunate lot – (‘that was our unfortunate lot.’)
7 Shattered
8 Elsewhere
9 ‘Much as we tried to block out their talk‘…. (it became impossible to relax…).
10 ‘Cosily ensconced‘
Ensconced – established, settled in a comfortable, safe or secret place. The adverb ‘cosily‘ conveys a happy mood.
11 Mutually convenient – ‘a mutually convenient rendezvous‘. We use this French word in English – but without the hyphen used in French. Our English word ‘weekend‘ is used in French with a hyphen, (French = un rendez-vous / un week-end‘).
12 Impact
13 To get together
14 "Take it in turns to be hosts….."
15 ‘It’s only natural’.
16 ‘Poor souls‘.
We use the word ‘soul‘ meaning a person – ‘there were only about 6 souls there’ = people – and also when describing people with affection or pity – ‘she’s a marvellous old soul‘.
17 Better still
Eg Better still, ask for your money back (=’What is an even better idea than the one just suggested is to ask for your money back’.
18 On neighbouring pitches.
Neighbouring – adj – situated near or very near (to another or others).
Eg "We worked in neighbouring offices."
Note the plural of ‘pitch‘ which you know already from ‘sandwiches‘ ‘matches‘ and so on.
19 Cause the least amount of disruption.
Disruption – disturbance or interruption
20 ‘Name and address supplied’.

Now back to the recording
Or a spot of grammar, maybe?
Or then again, maybe a bit of reading?
Or what about a visit to the home page?