Voice 1
Welcome to Spotlight. I’m Gillian Woodward.
Voice 2
And I’m Colin Lowther. Spotlight uses a special English method of broadcasting. It is easier for people to understand, no matter where in the world they live.
Click here to follow along with this program on YouTube.
Voice 1
The weather in the United Kingdom is weird. It changes a lot. It can be hot one day and cold the next. A few years ago, my cousins from Canada decided to visit. They wanted to know what the weather would be like in June. But I could not tell them because I did not know. I told them to bring clothes to keep them warm and clothes to keep them cool. But I also told them to bring a waterproof coat. I did not know what temperature it would be. But I knew one thing. It was going to rain.
Voice 2
It rains a lot in the UK. Sometimes the rain is heavy and sometimes it is light. But mostly it is constant. In most places, it rains over a hundred days a year. It rains even more in the far north. The Shetland Islands are the most northern part of the UK. There it rains more than two hundred days a year.
Voice 1
So, you would expect to hear us talking a lot about rain in the UK. We do. But the English language is a little like the weather in the UK. Its rules are difficult to predict. And when someone talks about rain, they may not really be talking about rain.
Voice 2
This is because we are using idioms. Native English speakers often use idioms in their speech. Idioms are words and phrases where the meaning is not clear from the individual words. These phrases are difficult for non-native speakers to understand.
Voice 1
Today’s Spotlight is on rain idioms. We explore seven common rain idioms. Most are not about rain at all. But these idioms will help you sound like a native speaker.
Voice 2
Our first rain idiom is the phrase “come rain or shine”. This phrase means that you promise to do something whatever happens. I could say, “‘I will visit you come rain or shine.”’ This could mean that I will visit you whether it is good or bad weather. But it means more than that. It means ‘I will visit you whatever happens.’ It is a definite promise.
Voice 1
Our second English idiom uses two different phrases. English speakers from the UK say “It never rains but it pours.” English speakers from the USA say “when it rains, it pours.” The two have the same basic meaning.
Voice 2
If one bad thing happens and then more bad things happen, you might use this idiom. If bad or inconvenient things happen again and again, you might say, “Oh dear, it never rains but it pours.” It is a way of saying that bad things are happening repeatedly.
Voice 1
This idiom has nothing to do with the weather. It could be a bright sunny day and you would still say, “It never rains but it pours.”
Voice 2
So, if one sunny day a person could not get his car to start, then his computer went wrong, and then he had a power cut, he might say, “It never rains but it pours”.
Voice 1
Another English rain expression is “save it for a rainy day.” This means to save money or another resource for a future unknown and unexpected need.
Voice 2
A person might use this phrase if her motorbike broke down. If she faced a big bill to repair it. She would be glad if she had saved money for a rainy day.
Voice 1
A fourth English rain idiom is to be “right as rain.” This means to feel well. It has nothing at all to do with rain!
Voice 2
For example, say a person has been sick for a few days. He starts to feel a bit better. He might tell his friends, “I will be right as rain next week.” He is saying that he thinks he will feel normal the next week. The next week, he might say, “I am feeling right as rain.” It would mean he is feeling healthy.
Voice 1
Another strange idiom is to “take a rain check.” This is something that you say when you can’t accept someone’s invitation to something. But it also means that you would like to accept that invitation on another occasion.
Voice 2
Imagine a friend asks you to meet her for coffee. You want to go, but you cannot. You are already busy that day. You might say something like, “I will take a rain check on that. I am already busy that day.” You would mean that you cannot go to coffee on the day your friend suggested. But your friend would understand that you would like to go another time.
Voice 1
The phrase “rain check” actually came from US baseball. When there was too much rain for a team to play, they would give spectators extra tickets. These tickets would be good for the next game. That way people could still watch the game they paid for.
Voice 2
The sixth idiom is the phrase “to rain on someone’s parade”. It means to ruin someone’s plans or to make them less excited about those plans. Imagine a boy is going to a party. He is excited, because he thinks he is going to meet a girl he likes there. But you know the girl is doing something else. If you tell him, he might say something like, “You are really raining on my parade.”
Voice 1
This phrase comes from real experience. The organizers will have to cancel a parade if it rains. The parade is ruined. If you rain on someone’s parade, you cause disappointment. It is the same feeling a person has if an event they looked forward to is cancelled.
Voice 2
The final idiom for this program is “Raining cats and dogs.” Surprise! This idiom is really about rain. But cats and dogs are not falling from the sky!
Voice 1
If someone says, “It is raining cats and dogs,” he means it is raining very hard.’ It is not just a light shower. It is a very heavy downpour.
Voice 2
Experts do not know where this phrase came from. One of the earliest uses is in a poem written in 1710 by Jonathan Swift alled “A Description of a City Shower.” In the poem, the Irish writer describes a storm so powerful that it pushes animals from the rooftops. People talk about this kind of rain when they say “raining cats and dogs.”
Voice 1
In the UK people talk about the weather a lot. They always have something to say about it because it is always changing. The weather is a great topic of conversation. The idioms in this programme will not always help you to talk about the weather. But they will help you sound more like a native speaker. Practice these idioms as much as you can. Use them with your friends.
Voice 2
Did these idioms surprise you? Which idiom did you think was the strangest? We want to hear your thoughts. You can leave a comment on our website. Or email us at spotlightenglish.com. You can also comment on Facebook at facebook.com/spotlightradio.
Voice 1
The writers of this program were Katy Blake and Dan Christmann. The producer was Dan Christmann. The voices you heard were from The United Kingdom. All quotes were adapted for this program and voiced by Spotlight. You can listen to this program again, and read it, on the internet at www.spotlightenglish.com. This program is called, “English Idioms: Rain”.
Voice 2
You can also get our programs delivered directly to your Android or Apple device through our free official Spotlight English app. We hope you can join us again for the next Spotlight program. Goodbye.
Question:
Did these idioms surprise you? Which idiom did you think was the strangest?
All the idioms were very interesting. I had only heard the idiom “raining cats and dogs”. Thank you, it was very useful for expressing feelings and situations well.
You’re welcome!
Welcome
Hello
Think you
I always thought that the idiom “raining cats and dogs” is a very strange one, but I don’t think it’s commonly used by English people, there is another idiom that I’ve heard alot which is “it’s raining buckets” I think it’s more commonly used. I also noticed that in some idioms rain is considered a good thing and in some others it’s a bad thing.
By the way, In Arabic we have a saying that goes: “The beginning of rain is a single drop”. Which means great things start with small action. And this can also be used in negative way, like big catastrophe can start by a small mistake. It conveys a similar meaning to the English proverb “The journey of a thousand mile starts with a single step”.
Thanks for the great episode as always ❤️.
save it for a rainy day
Hi.
The most strange idiom is raining cats and dogs.One would imagine that when it rains in Egland cats and dogs fall from the sky.
Thank you very much
The all idioms are very interesting as intriguing. I like the “com with rain or shine”, “it never rains but it pours”, “rain check”, all
What a great program,thanks a million
You’re welcome!
This is my first time l come this website l enjoyed with these episode thanks
We are glad you enjoyed the episode. Welcome!
How are you
it was so cool but i think music is annoying in background
Yea 2
this music so annoying
It’s amazing.
Thank you
I really love this part of Spotlight, because I found it very amazing, and I like the ediom of: “it’s rain cats and dogs” , it’s very expressive.
What a great website!!!
Thanks! We are glad you like it.
All the languages were very interesting and I think this page is very useful to express feelings and situations well.
The idiom “raining cats and dogs” is a very strange one; I don’t think it’s commonly used by English people; imagine that when it rains in Egland, cats and dogs fall from the sky.
The saying “raining cats and dogs” is very strange. I don’t think English is commonly used. Imagine when you live in England there may be cats and dogs.
I didn’t know that the UK rained much more than Latin America.
In this podcast, we can appreciate the British accent, as we can see in the British accent the words have different pronunciations than American English. In this podcast, they were talking about different languages and the phrases they have. Also the meaning of some things such as rain. Just like in Spanish, other countries have phrases like “raining cats and dogs” When you read this it may sound strange but it means that it is raining super hard. For me, this sounded strange in English because I was not used to hearing it in another language. The language that surprised me the most and seemed somewhat strange to me was Arabic, I think they have interesting phrases with very curious meanings.
These idioms surprised me because I had never heard or understood their idioms. This is new for me because in Peru you never heard people say “It is raining cats and dogs” Simply you say “It’s raining a lot” but these idioms make me understand. From what I can understand idioms are more common when you have a conversation with English people. Also I think I should use these idioms more so that when I speak it is more fluent.
Yes, these idioms surprised me. I think they are all unique, just like their meanings. I learned about some of them and they were interesting. There was one that caught my attention and it was the last idiom that said “It is raining cats and dogs” I was surprised because I thought it meant that cats and dogs were falling from the sky, but it meant that it was raining very hard. I think I had heard this expression before but I didn’t interpret it well, now I know what it means and it’s very interesting. On the other hand, I think the idiom that was the strangest for me was the one that said “I will visit you come rain or shine”, it’s strange for me because when I read the words I didn’t imagine that its meaning would be something delicate, well in my case, I didn’t imagine it like that. Or that only a few words could mean something big. I think that if you don’t analyze it well you might not understand it but when you understand it, it’s something very touching and sentimental. It means that no matter what happens, I will always visit you. You can be in your lowest or happiest moments or there is an earthquake, a party, or a hurricane, you don’t care, you promise that person that you will always come to see how that person is and visit that important person in your life no matter what happens in the world. From my point of view, that’s what I understood from the idiom, it was very strange and good at the same time for me.
Yes, many of the idioms are quite surprising! “Llueve a cantaros” is particularly strange, as it is a very vivid image but only refers to heavy rain. “Take a rain check” is also interesting, as it relates to sports rather than the weather.
“Raining dogs and cats” for me is the strangest because it doesn’t make any sense to me, and needs an extra explanation.
Always the idioms were fascinating. I had only heard the idiom “raining cats and dogs” feelings and situations well. I think these spotlights help other people to learn about another idiom
I find idioms about rain quite surprising. What I find most strange is “take a rain check”, I find it curious how it is used to reject an invitation temporarily.
Hello, good morning. I had free time this morning so I decided to listen this program and really surprised me!! I couldn’t expect any phrase. The meaning of this phrase it’s very far from what I thought, but l enjoyed when I listened to this program and was very useful . I will practice this phrases every day. And finally i want to say thank you so much for this amazing program.
Hello
No comment
I like this lesson
I’m grateful for you 🙂
Great! We are glad you liked this lesson!
Hi Ram
Thanks spotlight l hope a Liren English
i really appreciate how uk native speakers are creative with words and creating such useful, meaningful idioms we could utilise in our daily life to express our thoughts
Strangest idiom was “raining cats and dogs” it was fun
Hi,
“This episode was really amazing! I enjoyed learning about the strange idioms, and it made me laugh . The expression ‘raining cats and dogs’ was particularly surprising. Thank you for creating such engaging content, and a big thank you to the podcast team!”
You’re welcome!
Idiom
inconvenient
decided
The strangest idioms (oh dear,it never rains but it pours)Because it describes the bad state of a person.
yes but i learn some thing new that was help me thanks
Thank you
This is the first time a written comment although I wanted to write a lot of times, cause I feel weak in English. Thank you for this program.
Thank you for commenting! You are welcome for the program. Keep practicing!
yes
How to use it in teaching English?
Welcome
Its so good i surprise from this program the sound its very clear and i cant understand Maybe 60% from this program I am still a beginner in English and I hope that this program will help me❤️
Yes, I think this program will help you! Keep up the good work!
It is so good lesson really thanks
You are welcome!
“come rain or shine” and “saved it for rainy day” are two siutable for me to use every day. Particularly the “raining cats and dogs” will sometimes be used but will be never forgotten because it is quite impressive. Thank you so much.
its rainin cats an dogs:in 15.centry,in UK,roofs was made from cane and sraw. dog and and cats when climb the roofs to warm,and when its rain, they were faal in house .
Wow
It’s very nice
It’s very beautiful
Yes,it surprised me the strangest that rain cats and dogs
An idiom in my country
(it rains a thread from the sky)
Hello
How are you
Thank you for these informations , it was so hopeful to me to know a new phrases to improve my English conversation , all of these phrases were strange to me cause it is my first time to hear , so thank you again .
You’re welcome! Keep up the good work.
Idioms spotlight directly
I wish to learn English
It’s very excited for me
Very interesting, this the first time i heard this idioms
Raining cats and ducks
This idiom has nothing to do with the weather. It could be a bright sunny day and you would still say, “It never rains but it pours.”
l like it
How wonderful, how did I not know it before?
For motivation, I started practicing with you and from you before the end of the year by a day. Date: 12/31/2024
Tuesday
5:13 PM. I will see how my level changes during the year 2025, and I will not forget you.
Excellent! May your level improve greatly in 2025!
good
Think you
You’re welcome!
I won’t to learn English language I’m from country Sudan
I hope to learn English
I,like it
I have no discussion
São Paulo City, Brazil 13, 2025
Dear : Katy Blake, Dan Christmann, Gillian Woodward, and Colin Lowther:
My name is Severino Ramos and I am from Brazil, and I live in São Paulo city.
Question number 1. Yes, they did. I did not know those idioms in English. Then they were surprised for me. But I know one of them. “Raining cats and dogs”
I have heard about it all the time since I was a child by my grandma, my grandpa, my mother, my dad, and everybody especially when it is raining here in my country Brazil.
Question number 2: I think the strangest idiom is Take a rain check; when someone invites you to do something but you cannot go to a coffee on that day because you are busy.
Yours regard,
Severino Ramos