In this mini episode, you will learn the idioms “to luck out” and “to luck into.”
Episode 347 of the Everybody ESL podcast is a mini episode that teaches you the idioms “to luck out” and “to luck into.” Send your questions about English and your comments and suggestions to EverybodyESL@gmail.com! (And let me know if you’d like to record the introduction to a future episode.)
Intro
“Hi, everyone! This is Gamze, from Izmir, Turkey. And you are listening to (the) Everybody ESL podcast.”
Welcome to episode 347 of Everybody ESL, the podcast for everybody who wants to improve their English, practice their English, or just learn more English. My name is Ben, and I have a mini episode for you today, where I am going to teach you about one English topic. You can subscribe to the Everybody ESL podcast at Apple podcasts and wherever you find your podcasts. If you like Everybody ESL, leave it a good review so other people can find out about it too. And if you have any questions, comments, or suggestions for me, please send an email to EverybodyESL@gmail.com. Okay! Let’s get on with this mini episode.
The episode
In this episode, I am going to teach you an interesting idiom. And that idiom is “to luck out.” To luck out. That’s luck—l-u-c-k, out—o-u-t. To luck out.
This idiom might look a little bit strange to you. “To luck out.” What does it mean to luck out? “To luck out” means to be lucky or to succeed at something by luck. To succeed by being lucky.
This looks a lot like a phrasal verb—you know, those special words that are made of two parts, a verb and a preposition, or a verb and an adverb. But in this case, I don’t think we can really call this a phrasal verb because luck isn’t a verb. We never use luck as a verb. But I guess we kind of do in this idiom, “to luck out.”
Let me give you an example of a situation where you might hear someone use this phrase:
“We bought our plane tickets very late, and we lucked out. We bought the last two tickets.” We bought our plane tickets late and we lucked out. We bought the last two tickets.
In this case, we lucked out means we got lucky. We were lucky. There were only two tickets left, and we were able to buy them. We succeeded. We succeeded in buying our tickets by luck. Maybe if we had been a little bit later, the tickets would have been gone, but we lucked out. We were lucky. That’s why we were able to buy those tickets. We lucked out.
There is another very similar idiom. But this other idiom works a little bit differently. This other idiom is “to luck into.” To luck into. Instead of luck out, this is luck into. And this one is different because it always goes with a noun. To luck into something. You have to put something at the end: to luck into something. And it means to get something or to receive something or to accomplish something by luck. It means to get something by being lucky.
And here is an example that will show you this idiom:
“My friend needed a new job, but he didn’t even apply for a job. Instead, He was walking down the street, and somebody offered him a job. He lucked into his new job.” He lucked into his new job. In other words, he got his new job by luck. He got his new job by being lucky.
That is “luck out” and “luck into,” two interesting idioms that I think you should know.
Outro
This is the end of episode 347 of Everybody ESL. Remember: if you have questions about English, or if you have comments for me, or if you would like to record an introduction that I can play at the beginning of future episodes—the same way Gamze recorded the introduction you heard at the beginning of this episode—send an email to EverybodyESL@gmail.com. I’ll be back soon with a new episode. And until then, keep going, keep practicing, and keep learning. I’ll see you soon. Goodbye!