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  • 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.

Hi this is Tutor Nick P and this is Idioms 280. The idiom today is to "know what's

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