Auld Lang Syne

In It's a Wonderful Life

By James Taylor

My favourite

Imagen en Flickr CC

Happy New Year 2013!

Tying the knot in this cold…

Imagen en http://www.flickr.com
/photos/24446474@N03/5497534682

A couple of friends are getting married in a week. I used to hate weddings but now I love them. I love the fact that people still believe in love and the fact that people are still so optimistic that weeks in advance they know they are going to have fun on whatever day the wedding is!

And I love these songs that I have heard in real and filmed weddings:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KtBbyglq37E Aretha Franklin

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SbUC-UaAxE Guns and Roses

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tj75Arhq5ho Metallica

What's your wedding song? (real, unreal, filmed, dreamed)

THE ROARING 20s

Imagen: flickr CC

In the 1920s the USA was characterized by economic prosperity, changes in lifestyle and culture, and modernity. This period was also referred to as the Jazz Age or Decade of Optimism.

http://www.1920-30.com/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8LLfFY9pQg

How important is optimism? Has the sense of optimism changed lately?

Summer Memories

Last night I saw a movie in an open air cinema. The movie itself was not great, but the atmosphere was amazing: a breeze in a very hot night, a couple of shooting stars, the smell of sandwiches being made. I then remembered when I was a child and I used to go to this kind of cinema with my family every summer.

Do you have any summer memories you would like to share?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95wzYxbZTuM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g3mFTwlK9TA

"Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?..."

In this little town, I have seen trees made of wire with sentences hanging from their branches, a poem that talks about daring and fainting on an emergency exit, an excerpt from  “A Hundred Years of Solitude” on a notice-like poster, chapter 7 of a novel written in chalk on the way upstairs, a song by Leonard Cohen on the wall. World Book Day deserved those types of manifestations.

Imagen: http://flickrcc.bluemountains.net/flickrCC/index.php?terms=books&page=3&edit=yes&com=no

How have you celebrated World Book Day? What excerpt of what book would you read to others?

Twisting the plot

Take a song you like.

I’d go for this one:

http://www.lyricsmode.com/lyrics/b/band_of_horses/infinite_arms.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4H1h32vqDxE

What did you learn from listening to it? Vocabulary? Pronunciation? Intonation? How can music help you improve your English? Which songs have helped you improve it?

An instant out of time

I found this unique website (1000 words to describe a picture):

http://www3.sympatico.ca/canvasit/canvasit/words.pdf

Is there any of these photos you'd like to describe using some of the words from the list?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/gallery/2012/feb/11/24-hours-in-pictures#/?picture=385852016&index=0

Language Gaps

Have a look at the following links (thank you Juan):

http://matadornetwork.com/abroad/20-awesomely-untranslatable-words-from-around-the-world/
http://matadornetwork.com/abroad/20-more-awesomely-untranslatable-words-from-around-the-world/

Can you think of any English term that has no equivalent in Spanish, or that in order to be translated a long explanation is required?