You are late, baby you know what I hit a deer. Really? And then you know what happened, these
guys mugged me and see my wallet is empty, there's just nothing at all. You think I'm
a child and then you know what a dog bit me. Oh my gosh! Do you also give such pathetic
excuses? Oh I can surely understand your plight, may be you are running out of excuses I can
totally understand. I suggest that you please stay with me in this lesson coz I’m going
to teach you some relevant excuses that you can use may be with your friends or may be
with your boss. Stay with me and my name is Michelle, I’m your tutor for today.
Let’s start. Let's look at the first one. Here, the traffic was terrible, what kind
of an excuse is this? This is a classic excuse. What do we mean by classic? Classic means
evergreen, you can use it in all circumstances. But of course, not when you are going to your
neighbour’s house which is just next door. You can't say that, the traffic was terrible.
When you are travelling far, you can use this excuse, that the traffic was terrible. You
know how difficult it is to pass through a jam on a Monday morning. If you have, then
you've surely hit the right chord. But if you haven't had a smooth ride, then you can
tell your boss, I’m so sorry sir, the traffic was really terrible. I really hope that your
boss is considerate enough to accept your excuse and he will most probably.
Let's look at the second excuse, i couldn't find a parking space. What is a parking space?
A place where you can park your car or your vehicle, it could be anything. It could be
a car, it could be a bike, it could be a chopper, umm some of you may be, not for me really.
So I couldn't find a parking space. So there was no space to park the vehicle. So this
one here is used when you have your own means of transport or something that you own, own
means of transport. So, how you can use it in a sentence would be, I’m so sorry for
being late, I couldn't find a parking space. And I'll tell you something about my friend,
he went for an interview and he was early actually but the parking ate his time and
he actually became 5 minutes late instead of being early at the location. So he went
inside the interview hall and he was quite nervous, so out of sheer nervousness, he said
I’m so sorry, I can't find a parking space and you know what the funny part, he doesn’t
even own a car and that was his first job interview. But you know the bosses, I mean
sorry the interviewers just believed him. It's so funny right.so it's a tried and tested
excuse, so you can just use it without any care, go ahead.
Let’s look at the third one; the roads were chock a block. Chock a block, what's that?
Sounds familiar? No. this is used to talk about, when the road is extremely crowded
or extremely jammed. Yes this is used to talk about jammed roads. Okay, picture yourself
okay, you are in your car and the road is flooded with other cars which are just not
moving. They have halted absolutely and you get a call from your dentist, who says, hey
Patrick when are you reaching? And you've already cancelled your previous appointments
with the dentist due to other reasons and you really don't want to cancel this appointment.
So what do you tell them? I'll be there in just half an hour; the roads are chock a block.
That’s how you can use it, quite simple. Isn't it? So it'll surely help you with your
dentist.
Let's look at the fourth one. Sorry I didn't hear the alarm clock.is that common? Do you
use that? You know there are different ways of saying the same phrase. You could say that,
the alarm clock didn't
go off. This means that the alarm clock did not ring, which is quite a high possibility
sometimes and if it's not then just use it.
Let's look at the next one, there's another way of saying this and that could be I slept
right through the alarm, this means that while the alarm was still buzzing, zzzzzz something
like that, I don't know how your alarm clock buzzes really. So when it's still buzzing,
you know you continue to sleep and you didn't wake up, that's what it means, I slept right
through the alarm.
Actually hostel is a very good place to learn discipline, However, on one fine day, Nikki
did not wake up and her warden had to wake her up and what does she say, when she saw
her warden, she was so scared, she said, sorry sir, I slept right through the alarm or sorry
sir the alarm clock didn't go off, you can use any of them.
Let's look at the next one. I had to wait ages for the transport. So ages here means
a very long time period, yes very long time period. Long time. A very long time. Right
so transport here could be anything, could be your car, or you know, sorry not a car
in this case, coz car is owned generally by us. So when you own a car, you can use this.
I couldn't find a parking space. However, when you are using transport, it generally
talks about public transport. So that could be a bus or that could be a cab. Yes public
transport. So if you are going to the university and you are late for your class, you can tell
your teacher, sir I'm very sorry for being late, I had to wait ages for the bus. Right
or if you are going for an interview, you could say, I had to wait ages for the cab,
anything of that sort and this is how you can use this phrase.
Let's look at the next one; it's not an easy place to locate. What do we mean by locate?
Locate means this, to find something. So if a particular place or a particular location
is very hard to find, then you can use this, it's not an easy place to locate. One evening
I wanted to go to the Phoenix guest house and I asked my friend that you know can you
help about with the way of this place and he said, see I don't know the way, either,
if you're going to Phoenix guest house, then please see the map carefully because it's
not an easy place to find or it's not an easy place to locate. There’s one way of saying
this, the same phrase. I’ll write it for you. It is I got lost coming here. So if you
are going to a place and you get lost on the way, like to a friend's wedding and you are
not able to find the place and you arrive late at the wedding and your friends are bound
to ask you, why are you late? You could just say, this place is so remote, I got lost coming
here. That's how you can use this phrase, awesome isn't it?
So with this, we've learnt the first phrase which is a classic excuse and this you could
use with your personal transport. This can be used when the roads are completely jammed.
This one can be used with your boss or your, you know teacher or may be the warden as I
gave you an example. And this one here as well can be used in the same way. And the
last one can be used when you are arriving late at a friend's wedding. You know we are
being very clever here, in this excuse, whom are we blaming? You are blaming the alarm
clock. Of course if you are late, it's an excuse right, you are not saying the truth
always. So you could just blame the alarm clock and what do we do here? Who are we blaming?
We are blaming the transport and that's not all. We don't just blame the alarm clock and
the transport; we are so over smart that we also blame the location. So now you know exactly
what to say when you are late and since you have been so sweet to me that you stayed till
the lesson, I mean so far in the lesson, I also want to be a bit sweet to you and I'm
going to share with you two surefire tips to prevent you from being late. Let's look
at them, the first one here. What does it show? So what you can do is, you can set your
clock forward by an odd number of minutes, so let's say currently it's 10.10. However,
you set your clock at 10.17, so you think that you have less time when actually have
more. This really works for me. So I'll write it for you. Set your clock forward. And here
empathy, yes it's really important to empathize with person who is waiting. You know it's
really not fun to make a person wait even if it's unintentional so imagine yourself
in their shoe and you'll actually understand the urgency of the situation. So try and be
on time and if you are at all late, please use these excuses.
Thank you so much for being with me, now I have to rush for another class and if you
don't rush and I stay here then I'll blame you for keeping me stuck here. I hope to see
you soon with another useful lesson, till then you miss me and I'm gonna miss you, bye
take care.