#40: Unusual names

Micro-listenings | C1

…some kind of romantic notion…

A notion is an idea or belief about someone or something.

e.g. “He has this weird notion that the whole world is out to get him.”

…the day I figured it out…

The phrasal verb ‘to figure something out’ means to finally understand something, or finally find the solution to something.

e.g. “It’s taken me years, but I’ve finally figured out how to keep houseplants alive.”

…a certain amount of baggage…

We use the word baggage to describe feelings or parts of our personality that shape the way we think and act. These are our past experiences that we carry around with us (like baggage).

e.g. “I should warn you, I’ve got a lot of emotional baggage from my childhood.”

…it would really bother me…

This is an example of the way we can use would to talk about repeated experiences in the past. Its similar to used to, but adds a much greater sense of emotion (often nostalgia, athough not in this speaker’s case).

e.g. “When we were growing up we would spend every summer exploring the woods.”