If you’d like to learn something new in English but don’t want to spend too much time on it, this new section is here to do just that – bring you interesting and fun bits of English vocabulary and grammar.
You can try and use it right away – sneak it into an email or a conversation with a friend or colleague. It will help you remember it better and after a while you’ll even start to see it everywhere, in films, in books etc. 🙂
Bits and bobs
Today, let’s have a look at the the expression used in the title:
bits and bobs (idiom) pl (plural only), also bits and pieces – small things or jobs of different types
There are just a few bits and bobs of furniture in the office.
No one knows exactly what happened. All we have is a few bits and bobs of information so far.
I’m almost finished, I just have a few bits and bobs to do around the house before we leave.
I never thought it would take me this long to pack, but I have so many bits and bobs scattered around the house!
Have you noticed that in all the examples above the phrase bits and bobs is used with a few, just a few or (so) many? That’s how it’s commonly used in spoken English.
In Slovak, please
Idioms and phrases such as this are usually quite difficult to translate as they add “colour” to the language rather than “fact”. However, in this case the Slovak translation could go something like “všetko možné“, “čo-to“, “aký-taký” etc.
No one knows exactly what happened. All we have is a few bits and bobs of information so far.
Nikto nevie, čo presne sa stalo. Zatiaľ máme iba aké-také informácie.
I never thought it would take me this long to pack, but I have so many bits and bobs scattered around the house!
Nemyslel som si, že mi bude toľko trvať sa pobaliť, ale v byte mám rozhádzané všetko možné!
