| Helen: | Hello, and welcome to The English We Speak. My name is Helen. |
| Rob: | And I'm Rob. |
| Helen: | I saw you looking for your headphones earlier; did you find them? |
| Rob: | No, Helen. I looked for them everywhere. Someone must have nicked them. |
| Helen: | Nicked them? What do you mean? |
| Rob: | Oh, sorry, what I mean is someone stole my headphones. To nick something means to steal something. |
| Helen: | That's terrible. But how is it spelt? |
| Rob: | It's spelt N.I.C.K. nick, to nick something. |
| Helen: | My son's best friend is called Nick. It's the same spelling, isn't it? |
| Rob: | It is, but not the same meaning. Here the word 'nick' is a verb and it's British slang too. |
| Helen: | Let's hear a couple of examples. What items have been stolen? |
|
| Man: | Someone nicked my bike this morning. |
| Lady: | Oh, no. Did you report it to the police? |
| Man: | Yes, I did. |
| Man 1: | Where are the chocolate biscuits I was saving? I am sure I saw them yesterday. |
| Man 2: | Sorry, I don't know. Blame Dave, he's always nicking things. |
|
| Rob: | So, one of them lost a bike and the other one lost his chocolate biscuits. |
| Helen: | Unlucky chaps. Maybe the police can help them. |
| Rob: | Yes. The police can definitely help them by nicking those petty thieves. |
| Helen: | That's very confusing. The police can nick too? They can steal? |
| Rob: | No, no, no, no. The police can't nick things from people. But when they arrest someone, we can say the person is nicked. It means they're arrested by the police. |
|
| Woman: | Have you heard from Inspector James? |
| Man: | No. He's working on a big case. I think they have just nicked the main suspect! |
|
| Helen: | So if a criminal is caught by the police, then we can say he's nicked. |
| Rob: | That's right. Let's go over the two meanings of the verb 'to nick'. First, if something is nicked, it means it's stolen. |
| Helen: | Like my pen got nicked. |
| Rob: | Yes, that's right. But if a person gets nicked, we mean he's arrested by the police. |
| Helen: | A comedian got nicked for throwing a pie at Rupert Murdoch. |
| Rob: | Yes, he did. Helen, you've got it. Just remember it's not a formal expression. |
| Helen: | Thank you. I'll keep that in mind. Bye for now. |
| Rob: | Bye! |
