Patty : I'm really excited for Aunt Mary's surprise birthday party this afternoon! Aren't you?
Susan : Yeah! How old is she?
Patty: She'll be 55 on May 14[fourteenth]
Susan: Wow! I didn't know that my mom was older - she's going to be 57 on September 2[second]. Anyway May's going to be so surprised to see us all here!
Patty: I know! But we still have to get all the food set up before she gets here... OK! We're all ready now. Shh. She's here!
All: Surprise!
Language Notes
- I'm really excited.. Notice the emphasis on "really." "Really" is used to emphasize the adjective "excited" here.
- Birthday party Notice that the normal stress for a compound noun falls on the first element of the compound.
- Aren't you? This negative tag is used to show that the speaker expects a positive answer. Patty assumes that Susan is also looking forward to the party.
- She'll be 55 Notice that "55" is stressed here. This detail answers the question "how old is she?"
- Fourteenth Notice that we use "th" for ordinal numbers, starting with 4 [but first, second and third]. The stress is on the second syllable [fourTEENTH]. Compare this with "fortieth: 40th"[FORtieth].
- She's going to be... Notice how this is pronounced like "gonna be." Instead of four syllables "go/ing/to/be" there are three syallable "ga/na/be."
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