28 Enero 2005 (viernes)

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Tarea

Ejercicios 8-20, 8-23
Paginas 269 y 271

For exercise 8-23, List some (at least three) differences between shopping in the United States and shopping in Hispanic countries. (¡Claro en español!)

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Examenes

Our next quiz is this Wednesday, on February 2.
Our next test is a week from Friday, on February 11.

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Notas

Today, we studied a new verb tense: the past imperfect. This is a different tense than the one we have been studying recently, the preterit.

The preterit indicates an action that happened at or during a specific time. For example, Yo me senté (I sat down). It doesn't have to be a specefic named time, but it's a specific event that we can pinpoint. It doesn't have to be a once-only action, but it has to be specific. For example, Dije perdón tres veces (I said excuse me three times).

The past imperfect, on the other hand, applies to events that happened over the course of some undetermined period of time. For example, Conducía a la casa de mi novia cada sábado (I drove to my girlfriend's house every Saturday). Notice that we don't know when I started this habit, how many times I actually did it, or when she finally got a restraining order to make me stop; it's just something that happened over the course of some unspecific time period.

The imperfect is almost always the tense you use for states of being. For example, if I have been sick, I might say Estaba enferme. It is also used exclusively when you are talking about things that used to be. For example, Cuando vivía con mi madre, mirabamos la televisión mucho (When I lived with my mother, we used to watch a lot of television). Last but not least, it is the tense you use for an action that was going on when another action (in the preterit) interrupted it or while another action (in the imperfect) was going on. For example, Hablaba con mi ex-novia cuando la policía llegó (I was talking to my ex-girlfriend when the police came).

Take a look on page 266 of ¡Arriba! for more information, and the imperfect conjugations of verbs is on page 265 (regular verbs) and 266 (regular verbs).

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Wednesday's homework was not collected at the end of class.