Hey, you! No episódio de hoje do podcast Inglês Online eu falo sobre o idiom let alone, que é suuuuper comum na língua inglesa. Ouvindo os vários exemplos do pod, você vai se familiarizar bastante com esta expressão e chegar bem mais perto do ponto onde é só abrir a boca que as palavras saem (se é que você já não está lá). Ouça, re-ouça e depois deixe seu exemplo nos comentários. Abraço – Ana!

Hello, what’s up? How are you doing? What did you have for lunch? How did you sleep last night?

Anyway, welcome to a new episode of the Inglês Online podcast. Today I have a really good expression for you. It’s a phrase… very, very common. And if you’re a listener of, of other podcasts, if you watch a lot of American TV or British TV, if you’re into movies and TV shows I guarantee you have already heard this expression before. But- is it rolling off your tongue? Is it something that comes to your mind when you want to express that idea? That’s the big question. I’m going to give you many examples today.

This phrase is let alone. Does it ring a bell? Sound familiar? Picture this: there’s this little guy, Tommy, who’s in school and his mother is talking about him, let’s say to the neighbor. Tommy’s mother says: Tommy never eats fruit, let alone vegetables.

He never eats fruit, let alone vegetables. Now, what is being said here? The first piece is Tommy never eats fruit, never! He never does it. Now, most kids would probably choose fruit over veggies if they had to pick one. My guess is, it’s easier to get a kid to eat mangoes and bananas than broccoli and eggplant.

Tommy won’t even eat fruit, which, let’s say, is the nicer option. Can you imagine when it comes time to eat vegetables? He just runs in the other direction – he wants nothing to do with vegetables. With fruit, he’s still in the room. But if you try to get him to eat broccoli he’ll get out of the room. That’s why his mother is saying, Tommy never eats fruit, let alone vegetables. No, no, no chance, no chance for Tommy.

Here’s another word, imagine that there’s this girl, Sally. She lives on her own but she doesn’t cook. She can’t even fry an egg. She can’t even fry an egg, let alone bake a cake. Again, what’s more work? Fry an egg or bake a cake? Or what’s the level of difficulty of these two things? I think we can all agree… Baking cakes is probably a bit harder, it’s probably a bit more work, a bit more complex than frying an egg. Sally can’t even fry an egg. She doesn’t have the ability to fry an egg, she just can’t do it, let alone bake a cake. I mean, she can’t even do something that is relatively easy like frying an egg. Do you think she can do something that is more complex like baking a cake? Nope, no chance, she can’t do it. Sally can’t even fry an egg let alone bake a cake.

Here’s an example with me. I can barely understand Japanese, let alone write in Japanese. Actually in this example, I’m actually exaggerating my abilities a little bit… Because when I say I can barely understand Japanese it kind of communicates that I can understand something in Japanese, but that isn’t even true. I can’t even understand the basics of Japanese, let alone write in Japanese. Come on… I guess what I’m saying here is writing in Japanese is a lot more complex than understanding Japanese. I can’t even understand it, let alone write it.

Let’s wrap it up with a final example. Mark never remembers his own birthday. I mean, he forgets his own birthday. Have you ever met someone like that? That forgets their own birthday? Mark never remembers his own birthday, let alone his friends’ birthdays. He can’t even remember his own, let alone his friends’. Nope, not a chance.

Tell me, can you think of an example from your own life? Something that is real for you, maybe it’s about you, maybe it’s about someone you know. Leave it in the comments, I’m curious.

Talk to you next time.

Key expressions

• Let alone
  

Vocabulary

is it rolling off your tongue? = você está falando isso (a expressão) com naturalidade?

be into something = ser chegado em algo

does that ring a bell? = isso soa familiar, faz lembrar algo ou alguém

Sound familiar? = (Does it) sound familiar?

when it comes to something = quando se trata de algo/alguma coisa

she lives on her own = ela mora/vive sozinha

wrap it up = encerrar, terminar

his friends’ = os (aniversários) dos amigos