Hi this is Tutor Nick P and this is Idioms 280. The idiom today is to "know what's
what. " Yeah. This is actually very commonly used in everyday speech. Somebody will
say I need to know what's what. Okay. So let's take a look at the note here. If
someone wants to know what's what, he or she wants to know the important things
that are needed to be known about a situation. It can also be used to express
that one wants to know the true facts or the most basic information about someone
or something. Some believe this term may have been coined as early as 1663. So that is
a while ago, by Samuel Butler in his book you "Hudibras. Okay. Let's continue. All right.
So here we actually have four examples to try to show you how we may use this
phrase. Because like I said it's used very, very commonly. So example number one
here says I need to know what's what with that company before I go on an
interview. If you have ever gone on a job interview,
sometimes the interviewer will ask you why are you applying to our company ? Do
you know anything about our company ? How do you see yourself helping our company ? So
you have to know what's, what's what with that company. You need to know at least
some very basic information about the company you are applying for. At least you
should. If you want a better chance of getting that job. All right. Let's look at
number two here. Before I put in for time off , well if you put in for time off, it
means you know, you're handing in some paperwork. So that you know, they can make
it official. That maybe you are able to get this time off that you're requesting.
So before I put in for time off from work, I need to know what's what with our
travel plans. So you know, are we definitely taking this trip ? You know,
what are the exact dates you know, which days specifically will I need off from
work ? So you need to know what's what with your travel plans before you can
put in the paper to ask or request for time off from your
job. Okay and number three here. If you want to
know what's what in the world you can no longer trust the mainstream news. You
must do your own research or you won't know what's really going on. Yeah. We hear
this all the time when we hear about fake news. There's a lot of fake news out
there. So before everyone used to just kind of completely trust everything that
was reported on the news. Now you have to question it. You have to look and maybe
check yourself if you're interested enough to make sure that what they're
telling you is really correct. And number four here. You cannot have him cover your
job. He does , he does not know what's what with handling this type of
responsibility. So maybe somebody wants somebody to substitute or handle their
job, but they may not really be qualified for this. So he doesn't really know
what's what with this particular job. So he probably would not do a good job in
covering this position. Anyway, I hope you got it. I hope it was clear. Thank you for your
time. Bye-bye.