Today’s phrasal verb is clean up- it’s a tricky one, with multiple meanings.
Clean up can mean to do really well in something like gambling, sports or in business ventures: ‘I cleaned up at our weekly poker game. I won over $150 bucks!’
Clean up can mean dressing in a more professional or attractive way than you normally would: ‘He really cleaned up well for the wedding on Sunday! I barely recognized him in the suit and tie.’
Clean up can also mean stopping and preventing more crime or corruption. This is often used by government organisations or bodies: ‘The new president has a plan to clean up our streets and be tougher on criminals and drug trafficking.’
The most common, and my least favourite use of clean up is, well, to clean and tidy an area. ‘This weekend I have to clean up the garden- it’s a mess!’
Our idiom for this week is clean as a whistle- this means really clean! You can also have a clean conscious, which means that you know you have done nothing wrong (in a moral sense).
So, which ‘clean’ phrase is your favourite? How do you express these things in your language?
English Class with Heather 