Everyday Life in a British Family

Let's see how Kitty, an English woman, passes her day. In the morning she cleans up the house, and it includes doing the beds, dusting the furniture, sweeping the floor, airing the flat, washing the dishes, brushing her children's clothes, doing shopping and cooking dinner. Her afternoon she devotes to sewing, ironing and two or three times a week to social work.

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There is a tradition in England that women do their laundry on Mondays when the bed linen is washed. Kitty laughs and says that she and a good many other females don't follow it. "I do my washing when I have time," – she says. We ask Kitty if her children help her about the house. She says that if parents are sensible, kids help a great deal with the household. For instance, her sons make their beds, tidy and vacuum the rooms and lay the table. The girls look after the babies and that is a good help to Kitty. Her husband is also good at assisting her in housekeeping. He saves a lot of money by putting right anything that goes wrong, repairing such things as the microwave oven, the lawnmower, the sewing machine. But Kitty tries to keep the evenings apart from getting the family meal for anything Fred (her husband) wants to do.

Twice a month she goes to the cinema with him, sometimes to a concert, getting an unmarried friend to come and babysit. Frequently they go along to the public house for a drink and Fred plays a game of chess or draughts and discusses the latest news or TV programme with his friends and colleagues.

Topic Nine: Climate and Weather

Dictation 23

Weather in New York

The only thing you can rely on is that New York weather is entirely unreliable. A temperature change of as much as 40ºF (degrees Fahrenheit) within a single day is not uncommon. It may be freezing cold one afternoon, and bright, warm and sunny the very next morning or unfortunately vice versa. According to the US Weather Bureau, New York City has a modified continental climate.

New Yorkers live in a relatively damp climate of cold winters and warm, humid summers. Hot spells can be difficult to bear. During the summer months there are brief but intense thunderstorms. Showers which continue for a few days are not rare. On an average it will rain or snow 120 days out of a year. New York

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has many beautiful sunny days, especially during autumn. July is the hottest month of a year, with a temperature of 73.9 ºF (degrees Fahrenheit) and the coldest months are January and February when people can experience a temperature of 30.8º (degrees). Most of the bitterly cold winds that come to New York are from the northwest.

Dictation 24*

The British Climate

The weather on the British Isles frequently changes but at the same time it is rather mild. In winter months Britain is affected by polar air. Then a cold, biting wind springs up and brings frosts. January and February are the months with most snow though it can fall as late as June in the Scottish Highlands.

Spring is the driest season. The sky is calm and clear, sometimes it drizzles. Thunderstorms are common in summer and the counties in the east get most rain, which is heavier in the hills and later great floods come. In early autumn, especially after a fine summer, the air is damp as the sun sinks lower. And strong winds bring stormy weather and gales. The moods of British weather are really surprising. It is true there are a lot of showers in London but the constant dense fog belongs more to fiction than to reality.

Droughts occur, but crops are never a complete loss, nor do animals perish. Sometimes a little whirlwind (a "twister") can destroy houses, heavy snowfalls and icy roads can stop traffic but fog is the greatest disaster that can happen, causing accidents. These events fill the newspapers, but in contrast with the heatwaves in New York, blizzards on the prairies or hurricanes in Florida and tornadoes in Kansas, British weather seems indeed favourable.