General Listening Quiz

Listen to the recording on hiring a moving company and read along with the conversation. Review the key vocabulary and the sample sentences.

Stacy: Hi.

Mark: Oh, Hi.

Stacy: Are, are you new in the neighborhood? [ Oh, yeah. ] Welcome, welcome to the neighborhood. [ Oh. ] Hey, I’m Stacy. I live across the street.

Mark: Oh, Hi, Stacy. I’m Mark. Mark Jones.

Stacy: Um. Looks like you’re moving. Do you need any help unloading your moving truck? I can have my husband come or my kids.

Mark: Um, well, fortunately, the movers are going to do that, but you’re welcome to, uh, help carry in a few things out from our car.

Stacy: Yeah, sure, I can go get ’em [them]. Where are you from?

Mark: Well, we’re originally from Chicago, but we just moved from a place called Springville.

Stacy: Oh, Springville, that’s, uh. Isn’t that the . . . the north end of the state

Mark: Yeah, just, yeah, not too far from here.

Stacy: How was your trip?

Mark: Well, it went pretty well. We hired a moving company, something my company paid for, and it was simply more convenient than packing all our stuff, renting a truck, and then moving everything ourselves.

Stacy: That’s nice. How does this moving company work then? Was it pretty good?

Mark: Yeah. Well, in many cases, you can pack your own things and just have the company load the boxes and your other items on the truck, or they’ll pack everything for you, and they can tow your vehicle behind the truck if you like, and they can even, you know, move heavy items like pianos.

Stacy: Wow, that’s nice. So, did everything go as planned?

Mark: Well, pretty much, except our cat disappeared about three [ Really? ] yeah about three hours before the movers left . . .

Stacy: Did you ever find it?

Mark: No, and uh, we’re not sure if she ran away, got hit by a car, or what.

Stacy: Oh, that must be really hard on your family. Sorry to hear about that. [ Yeah. ] Yeah, that must be rough. [ Yeah. ] No sign of the cat?

Mark: Not yet.

Stacy: Uh, I’m sorry. So, um, what do you do for a living?

Mark: Well, I’m a software developer.

Stacy: Oh, what do you do exactly in your job?

Mark: Well, um, most of the time, I develop educational software for schools [ Really? ] . . . Yeah, and at the moment, I’m working on several educational apps for, you know, smart phones.

Stacy: Oh, that’s . . . that’s great.

Mark: Yeah, it’s it’s a really good job. And, uh, so, how about yourself?

Stacy: Well, actually, I’m a high school history teacher.

Mark: Oh, wow, you know, actually, I’ve created two apps on world history that you might be interested in. Yeah.

Stacy: Serious?

Mark: Yeah.

Stacy: Oh, that sounds great. I’d love to see them. [ Yeah. ] By the way, um, you know, we’re having a barbecue at our place on Friday. [ Oh? ] Why don’t you come over . . . bring your family and get to know some of the neighbors?

Mark: Well, let me talk to my wife, but just so you know, we have nine kids. [ Serious? Nine kids? Wow ], so yeah, so they might eat all your food.

Stacy: Well, that’s no problem. That’s a lot of kids, but it’ll be fun. Hey . . . [ What? ] No, just listen. [ Hey. ] Did you hear that? Listen, listen. It’s coming from over there. It’s in one of the . . . there’s something in one of your boxes.

Mark: No way. Yeah.

Stacy: That sounds . . . That sounds like a cat. Is the cat in one of your . . . Did you find . . . Did the cat get in one of your boxes?

Mark: I don’t know. Let me look. Hey, let me move this box. Yeah.

Stacy: Wow!

Mark: Oh, no. I can’t believe it! I’m sure the family is going to be happy about this.

Sarah: Yeah. I bet. Congratulations!

• unload (verb): remove something from a truck 
  – Three men unloaded all of our things in two hours.
• hire (verb): give work or a job to someone 
  – I want to hire a company to clean our carpets before we move.
• load (verb): put something on a truck 
  – The movers are going to load the boxes onto the truck first.
• tow (verb): pull something behind another vehicle 
  – We had to tow our car to the mechanic because it broke down yesterday.
• vehicle (noun): car or truck 
  – You should never leave children alone in vehicles while you are shopping.
• rough (adjective): difficult 
  – Moving a family to a new city can be rough on children.
• bet (verb): think that something is probably true 
  – I bet that they’ll never move away from this area because their parents live here.