2. Topic - Pets

Hello, hello. I am James and I live in Manchester in the UK and you're listening to English with a brew. A podcast where I talk about different day-to-day topics to help you learn English in the most natural way possible and that is only by listening to it. So as we say in Manchester, get a brew on and let's get started. In today's episode I'm going to talk a bit about pets. The pets I have had in my life and the pets I have now and the pets that you can have or that other people might have. Last episode I talked a bit about my dogs and when I was little I had two dogs called Sam and Bodie. Sam and Bodie were both border collies and border collies are usually but not always black and white and have long fur. They were both very friendly and like to play a lot. Border collies, they need a lot of exercise. You have to take them for long walks and play with them a lot. I used to take them for a walk every day after school and after that I played football with them in the park. I used to kick the football as far as I could and they would run after it and then they would bring the ball back to me and I would just kick it again. Sometimes on hot and sunny days in the summer I kicked the ball into the canal. Canal is like a river but artificial with boats, canal boats and both Bodie and Sam loved to jump into the canal and swim and try and get the ball. There's lots of other different types of dog too. You can have Labradors, Poodles, German Shepherds, Dalmatians, like the movie. Do you have a dog? If you do, what type of dog do you have? Now that I'm older and I don't live with my parents, I don't have a dog but I do have a cat. My cat is called Monty and he is super cute. We got him from a rescue centre about four years ago or you can say we adopted him. His fur is as well completely black apart from one small white bit on his belly and he has big yellow eyes. You can get lots of different colours of cat too. You can have ginger cats, black and white cats, all white cats. Siamese cats, there are even cats without any fur at all like a Sphinx cat. My cat Monty is very friendly and he loves attention. He likes to lie down on my lap when I watch the television in the evening and usually in the winter when it's cold outside he sleeps in bed with us. But he's also very shy and extremely scared of strangers and of people he just doesn't know. So whenever someone knocks on the door he runs and hides under the bed. Some cats stay inside all of the time while other cats can go outside whenever they want. Monty can go outside, we let him. He has a cat flap like a small door so he can enter and leave whenever he likes but because he is a little timid he doesn't like to leave the garden which is okay by us because we live near a loud and busy road so we don't really mind. To have a pet is a big responsibility. It's important to look after them. You need to buy food, you need to give them water, cats need cat litter and you need to play with them and give them love and attention. Sometimes if they get sick or hurt themselves you have to take them to the vets so they can get some medicine or some other type of treatment and you need to think about things like when you go on holiday what will you do? Probably you can't take your cat with you so you might ask a neighbour to feed them while you're away or maybe you hire a cat sitter, someone who you pay to come and look after them. As well as cats and dogs there are lots of other pets you can have too. When I was younger or when I was little my brother had a rat which is similar to a mouse but bigger. To have a rat you need a cage, a sawdust for them to sleep and hide in. Rats are actually super intelligent. One friend had a type of lizard called a bearded dragon and they needed a heated tank because they like to be warm all of the time. Some other friends had birds like a budgie. They are really pretty but I think they can be a little bit noisy from time to time. Maybe you can have some fish. Some people have lots of fish swimming in a big tank but you have to clean the tank or replace the filter so that the water is always clean. These are just some of the pets that you can have but what about you? Do you have a pet? And if not, do you want one? What type of pet do you want? Tell me in the comments. And well that is everything for today's episode. This was episode two of English with Abru. I hope you enjoyed it. Let me know in the comments if you did or if you didn't and let me know as well what you'd like to hear me talk about in future episodes. I hope you have an absolutely wonderful day, morning, afternoon, evening, whatever time it is where you are. Take care.