I. adjective
COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES
a bit better/older/easier etc
▪
I feel a bit better now.
a simple/easy matter (= something that is easy to do )
▪
Putting together the bookcases is a fairly simple matter.
a simple/easy solution
▪
There is no easy solution to this problem.
an easy mistake (to make)
▪
She looks like her sister, so it’s an easy mistake to make.
an easy movement (= without effort )
▪
She swung her legs off the bed in one easy movement.
an easy option ( also a soft option British English ) (= a choice which is not difficult, or which needs the least effort )
▪
For most people, divorce is never an easy option.
an easy victory
▪
Arsenal expected an easy victory.
an easy walk
▪
From here it is an easy walk to the summit.
an easy way
▪
Here’s an easy way to cut up a mango.
an easy win
▪
The Australian appeared to be heading for an easy win.
an easy/difficult child (= easy or difficult to deal with )
▪
Marcus was a very happy, easy child.
an easy/soft target
▪
Some criminals now regard churches as easy targets.
be easy to imagine
▪
It’s easy to imagine how the change in the law caused a lot of confusion.
be hard/easy/impossible etc to please
▪
She’s hard to please. Everything has to be perfect.
difficult/easy to spot
▪
Drug addicts are fairly easy to spot.
difficult/hard/easy etc to guess
▪
It’s hard to guess his age because he dyes his hair.
difficult/impossible/easy/possible etc to detect
easy access
▪
a villa with easy access to the sea
easy chair
easy charm (= relaxed charm )
▪
Hudson was full of easy charm and smiles.
easy listening
easy money (= money that you earn easily )
▪
For many, selling drugs seems like easy money.
easy pickings
▪
There are easy pickings for thieves at these big outdoor concerts.
easy to clean
▪
Is it easy to clean ?
easy
▪
These questions should be easy for you.
easy/difficult/hard etc to follow
▪
The plot is a little difficult to follow.
easy/difficult/simple etc to use
▪
Drop-down menus make the program very easy to use.
far better/easier etc
▪
The new system is far better than the old one.
▪
There are a far greater number of women working in television than twenty years ago.
find it hard/easy/difficult etc (to do sth)
▪
Hyperactive children find it difficult to concentrate.
find sth/sb easy/useful/interesting etc
▪
She found the work very dull.
▪
Lots of women I know find him attractive.
▪
I found them quite easy to use.
free and easy
▪
the free-and-easy atmosphere of the local pub
how much better/nicer/easier etc
▪
I was surprised to see how much better she was looking.
▪
How much better life would be if we returned to the values of the past!
it is easy to exaggerate sth
▪
It’s all too easy to exaggerate the importance of these rather minor factors.
it is easy to overestimate sth (= used to say that something is not as important as some people think )
▪
It is easy to overestimate the effect of prison on criminals.
make sth difficult/easy/possible etc
▪
The use of computers has made it possible for more people to work from home.
make things worse/easier/difficult
▪
Measures to slow down traffic on the main street have actually made things worse.
much better/greater/easier etc
▪
Henry’s room is much bigger than mine.
▪
These shoes are much more comfortable.
nice and warm/clean/easy/quiet etc
▪
The house seemed nice and tidy.
sth is not an easy task sth is no easy task (= something is difficult )
▪
Recruiting experienced people is no easy task nowadays.
the hard/easy part
▪
Deciding what you're going to cook is the easy part.
the simple/easy answer
▪
There are a lot of problems and no simple answers.
within easy reach of (= close to )
▪
We live within easy reach of the shops.
within (easy) walking distance (of sth) (= near enough to be able to walk to )
▪
There are plenty of bars and restaurants within walking distance of the hotel.
within (easy) walking distance (= near enough to walk to easily )
▪
There are lots of restaurants within walking distance.
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ ADVERB
fairly
▪
Up to this stage it will have been fairly easy for them to break off their activities should the occasion demand it.
▪
It was a beautiful theory, and it was fairly easy to understand.
▪
If the ritual was completed, the adventurers still alive have it fairly easy .
▪
Fortunately, the elements are fairly easy to replace.
▪
Cultivation is apparently fairly easy and details of where to get the plants are available.
▪
They were fairly easy to move through and were cooler than surrounding areas.
▪
Fortunately, most are still fairly easy to spot, and usually catch out only new users, but they will improve.
▪
There were fan magazines that were fairly easy to deal with.
quite
▪
All paths and tracks are well defined and mostly signposted; route-finding quite easy .
▪
This was my favourite song as it was quite easy to sing and it had a stirring, catching rhythm.
▪
One of them, Rhuad Sgeir, was quite easy to identify.
▪
It's quite easy once you get the hang of it.
▪
To plate, look for the instructions in your manual, it is quite easy , once you are threaded up.
▪
So improving or updating an older model is quite easy .
▪
Because of the comparative thinness of the jigsaw blade, it is quite easy to steer it round quite tight curves.
relatively
▪
In fact, it's relatively easy , provided there is a market.
▪
A century ago, it was relatively easy to hide corruption.
▪
This distinction may be relatively easy to make in memory for situations encountered when driving.
▪
The United States has traditionally offered the poor relatively easy access to the middle class if they can find steady work.
▪
There was plenty of room on the course and it was relatively easy to lengthen it enough to test the professionals.
▪
Okra is relatively easy to grow given sufficient space.
▪
In the 1950s teacher training furnished a relatively easy route to the secure status of superannuated salary earner.
▪
The theory of semiconductor design is relatively easy to learn.
so
▪
This is not so easy to practise in the informal pool, for part of its charm is its tangled informality.
▪
It is not so easy to apply this reasoning to the case of General Electric or General Motors.
▪
Even so , it was never again to be so easy .
▪
It would be so easy to go soft on them.
▪
However, identifying a breach of the rule may not be so easy .
▪
Why is it so easy to spend your cash when it can take so long to earn?
▪
It was all so easy , and so worthwhile.
▪
She gloated inwardly at the memory. So easy !
too
▪
For the strong propaganda machinery it was almost too easy to transform what had once been marginal into the nearly official.
▪
It's too easy , as a divorced man living away from your children, to buy into self-pity.
▪
It is all too easy to do this, especially if we know no other ways of praying than our own.
▪
It was too easy an assumption.
▪
It's all been a bit too easy on the ear and eye.
▪
On the whole, her father had had a very easy life of it, too easy.
▪
And if playing is too easy , it might take all the fun out of it.
very
▪
Take careful note of the potential size - it is very easy to go wrong with these.
▪
The recipe is very easy to prepare, but it does take about 2 hours to cook.
▪
It's very easy to organise some investigative work by children on school meals provision.
▪
This is of course very easy since what the spreadsheet has stored in cells C and D is a time serial number.
▪
In the air, you will find all the modern machines very easy to fly but most are lighter on the controls.
▪
Comments ranged from tasteless, bland and bitter to very easy to drink.
▪
Breath Singers are usually very easy to speechread.
▪
It is visible with the naked eye, and its position close to Eta and Mu makes it very easy to locate.
■ NOUN
access
▪
Rocky terrain with relatively easy access is the shore to look for.
▪
That closeness has been all the greater because of the sea-routes that have made for easy access .
▪
For the most part sited high above the sea, it is climbable at all times and offers easy access .
▪
The trolley also passes several sprawling condominium complexes, giving thousands of people easy access to public transit.
▪
The sheltered housing is close to local amenities to allow residents easy access to shops and other facilities.
▪
There is a regular seminar programme, and easy access to professional bodies and institutions concerned with formal and non-formal education.
▪
Three out of five people in the Third World have no easy access to clean water.
▪
The Control Center provides a relatively easy access point to dBase.
answer
▪
Some materials still resist easy answers - gold is an example.
▪
Because the move to management requires transformation, though, no easy answers or quick fixes are provided.
▪
No easy answers came and there were many apparent paradoxes.
▪
I found no easy answer from within myself.
▪
Magona's reexamination of a highly contentious political event leaves no easy answers .
▪
So much for an easy answer .
▪
It's time to ask questions that don't have easy answers .
▪
But suddenly we find ourselves acknowledging that there are no easy answers to the dilemmas Christians face.
life
▪
His forefathers had built the mills, and it hadn't been a particularly easy life .
▪
It was not an easy life .
▪
I agree that it's not a particularly easy life for most people to support.
▪
From boyhood he disdained an easy life .
▪
Like Polonius, Amis passed on his secrets to an easy life .
▪
Nockerd Sockett had not had an easy life .
▪
I am all in favour of an easy life for horse and rider wherever possible.
matter
▪
Keeping track of attendance is no easy matter for schools.
▪
It is not an easy matter to quantify the economic role of government.
▪
The plaintiff's solicitor will have to go on affidavit about that, which is not an easy matter .
▪
Funding will depend on the sale of extraneous plots for other developments, not an easy matter in the current climate.
▪
Capital accumulation is a relatively easy matter for the self-employed but is almost impossible for the professional manager to achieve out of income.
▪
Judging the competition has taken quite some time and was no easy matter .
▪
It was an easy matter to buy my way on to the same flight.
▪
Capturing the image Photographs, however, are not such an easy matter .
money
▪
The easy money regime focused attention on monetary policy and contributed to the significance accorded to the money supply in later years.
▪
In discussing the easy money prescription we have chosen a fairly extreme version of it, in part to get students excited.
▪
Disadvantages: Some part-timers regard Koi dealing as a way of making easy money .
▪
People will tell you you can make easy money .
▪
The reason too much easy money and not enough dedication and genuine love for one's chosen work.
▪
Instead, he is expected to surrender one-third of the Championship and opt for some easy money .
▪
Owing to legal changes, young barristers can no longer earn easy money on undefended divorces, which are now done by solicitors.
▪
The opening years of the 1970s were a period of easy money .
option
▪
His refusal to take the easy option is admirable.
▪
In a situation of this sort ignorance is often the easy option .
▪
But their other argument is possibly more persuasive: it's that farm saving is not an easy option .
▪
It is, though, an easy option for simple Web pages.
▪
Well, he certainly achieved it but remember, winning championships is the easy option .
▪
Promising extra money, though welcome in itself, is the easy option .
▪
Trotting is very pleasant, but it's not an easy option .
▪
They have no dislike of getting their feet wet, while preferring to stay dry where the easy option exists.
part
▪
Getting on to Switchboard was the easy part .
▪
And that was the easy part .
▪
The easy part was the system itself.
▪
This is the easy part , proving difficult only for those with unsteady hands, poor vision or failure to comprehend.
▪
But knowing right from wrong is the easy part .
▪
The easy part is to say that he was bad, or to say how bad he was.
prey
▪
Like a wolf pack scenting easy prey , they dismounted and spread out.
▪
Men prowled the motel like packs of wolves searching out easy prey .
▪
More rarely, I watched them diving in the sea for sea urchins or other easy prey .
▪
We were barely moving through the water, an easy prey .
▪
The dams also render the animals easy prey for hunters and trap them when the water is drained for irrigation.
▪
Three groups are easy prey to the underclass's recruiting sergeant.
▪
It is easy prey - I've caught them myself.
▪
As a result, his party may look battered, easy prey for the Democrats.
reach
▪
Also within easy reach of many places of interest, including the new International Convention Centre.
▪
All are within easy reach of Gubbio which is among the best restored medieval towns in Umbria.
▪
A short climb from the tarn leads to the ridge wall, the summit then being within easy reach on the left.
▪
But the gannets of Bempton Cliffs are within easy reach of all.
▪
The latter were concentrated quite markedly in Stratford and Forest Gate within easy reach of the main railway line into the city.
ride
▪
Even if she manages to get through her first probationary year, life is not an easy ride for full members either.
▪
Sweeping views of the South Bay, incredible birdwatching, and an easy ride along a stream.
▪
They remind us that we are not called to an easy ride over the waves during our lifetime.
▪
Gazza makes his Lazio debut against his old club and his Tottenham pals aren't going to give him an easy ride .
▪
Holly's easy ride was over.
▪
It has not been an easy ride , however.
▪
Unlike the United States secretary of state, Colin Powell, last month, the president was given an exceptionally easy ride .
target
▪
But to the criminal she's was just an easy target .
▪
It was a natural and easy target for newspapers.
▪
Such an organization would have been an easy target for Labour's disciplinarians.
▪
That makes them easy targets for mining industry recruiters.
▪
You can see so little as you blunder on that you are an easy target for any animal seeking fresh meat.
▪
So we opt for cheap grace, and easy targets , instead.
▪
However, the uniformed, sixteen-legged crocodile was an easy target for ridicule.
▪
Most outsiders will point to coach Barry Switzer, who is an easy target .
task
▪
But it is no easy task .
▪
The library user who looks for books of art criticism is not necessarily going to have an easy task .
▪
It was not an easy task .
▪
Evaluating this set of foreign policies is no easy task .
▪
To forge peace and order into society is not an easy task of and for a people or a nation.
▪
Convincing shopkeepers and local firms that donating prizes is a very inexpensive form of advertising is usually a relatively easy task .
▪
In this brief look backwards, history has an easy task .
thing
▪
That's always a very easy thing to do on the periphery.
▪
This is not an easy thing to do creatively, especially while dealing with demographics.
▪
A fire would always be an easy thing from which a superhuman creature like the monster could escape.
▪
Screenwriting is a very easy thing for me to do.
▪
This is obviously not always an easy thing to do, especially if we are in the darkness of suffering.
▪
This is by no means an easy thing to accomplish; nothing of real esoteric value ever is easy to attain.
▪
It's not an easy thing to do...
▪
That's not an easy thing .
victory
▪
Haynes then steered the tourists to an easy victory with more than 11 overs to spare.
▪
Ford gratefully accepts, takes a sip and continues to watch as his team heads for an easy victory .
▪
The Ladies race produced another easy victory for Percival.
▪
The lopsided final score may suggest an easy victory .
▪
The Chargers dominated the Raiders on both sides of the line, walking away with a surprisingly easy victory .
▪
Left: new Honda V12 performed faultlessly for Senna to score easy victory .
▪
Still others cruised to easy victory , including 93-year-old Strom Thurmond, R-S.
way
▪
He was saying, I am going to kick a field goal; no sir, he took the easy way .
▪
But she wanted a quick, easy way to determine which states needed the money the most.
▪
This is an easy way of referencing for authors, but a bit of a nuisance for readers.
▪
College is simply an easy way for employers to identify workers with strong basic skills.
▪
Deependable Products now offer an easy way to remove and prevent induced voltages - the Nega-volt.
▪
But there are no easy ways of determining the actual role of women in decision making in the use of birth control.
▪
But these days, if it looks as if it's going to be nasty, I take the easy way out.
▪
Standing orders and direct debits - the easy way to pay gas, electricity and other bills and expenses.
PHRASES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
a rough/easy ride
▪
Any member on a committee to which Karl Barth belonged had a rough ride .
▪
But history says Bill Clinton may be in for a rough ride .
▪
Even after the Renaissance and the rebirth of learning had reached these shores ears were still having a rough ride .
▪
He cheered Tory backbenchers, but they predicted that the Chancellor could also face a rough ride unless the plan works.
▪
Well, it's turned out not so badly, he thought, although it's been a rough ride .
a soft/easy touch
▪
And he knew I was a soft touch , that I did most of the housework so he could be free.
▪
Artisans needed more than just fertile imaginations and a soft touch with a trowel to bring their work to life.
▪
Cool for Cats at Stennis Head - a soft touch E15b.
▪
Leeds are a soft touch when it comes to transfers.
▪
Middlesbrough showed a resilience that emphasised they are no longer a soft touch on their travels.
▪
My client was a soft touch .
▪
Next to it goes a soft touch 6a, Cocoluche, which has an easily avoidable 6b section.
▪
Terry was such a soft touch .
all the better/easier/more etc
▪
He offsets Roberts' operatic evil with a performance that commands all the more notice for its minimalism.
▪
His job was made all the more easier by drivers who hadn't bothered to take measures to stop people like him.
▪
If there is some meat left on the bones, all the better.
▪
It makes it all the more opportune.
▪
Superb defence by Karpov, all the more praiseworthy in that he was now in desperate time trouble.
▪
The dispute was all the more bitter because a prize was at stake.
▪
The inadequacy and treachery of the old leaderships of the working class have made the need all the more imperative.
▪
Weather experts say it was a relatively dry winter which makes the water recovery all the more remarkable.
be a good/quick/easy etc lay
▪
I don't deny it was a good lay .
be easy meat
▪
If her own mind could play tricks like that, she'd be easy meat for any of those giant prawns.
▪
If we think they are easy meat we will end up with egg on our faces.
▪
Quakers were easy meat at home.
▪
Unprotected by a shell, they are easy meat for insect larvae and flatworms.
▪
With most of the control surfaces shot away, they were easy meat for a Messerschmitt.
easy option
▪
Instead of working to keep their marriages, more and more people are taking the easy option and getting divorced.
▪
Some people think that studying languages instead of sciences is a soft option .
▪
But their other argument is possibly more persuasive: it's that farm saving is not an easy option .
▪
His refusal to take the easy option is admirable.
▪
In a situation of this sort ignorance is often the easy option .
▪
It is, though, an easy option for simple Web pages.
▪
Promising extra money, though welcome in itself, is the easy option .
▪
They have no dislike of getting their feet wet, while preferring to stay dry where the easy option exists.
▪
Trotting is very pleasant, but it's not an easy option .
▪
Well, he certainly achieved it but remember, winning championships is the easy option .
easy prey
▪
It is easy prey - I've caught them myself.
▪
Like a wolf pack scenting easy prey , they dismounted and spread out.
▪
Men prowled the motel like packs of wolves searching out easy prey .
▪
More rarely, I watched them diving in the sea for sea urchins or other easy prey .
▪
The dams also render the animals easy prey for hunters and trap them when the water is drained for irrigation.
▪
Then, as the softies were driven extinct, Harrington followed them, having no easy prey left.
▪
Three groups are easy prey to the underclass's recruiting sergeant.
▪
We were barely moving through the water, an easy prey .
it's as easy as falling off a log
make life difficult/easier etc
▪
But this arbitrary division of the country has not made life easier for either the North or the South.
▪
Having to adopt the fast-track method made life difficult for all three.
▪
Jim was uninterested in learning the kind of ecclesial footwork that would have made life easier for himself and his parish.
▪
Latecomers, however, do make life difficult - and unnecessarily expensive.
▪
The lack of economic statistics has made life difficult for economists and money managers for the past few weeks.
▪
There's no greater pleasure than handing over money to a local supplier who helps make life easier.
▪
To make life easier in the future, will you be publishing an index?
▪
With the advent of electrics, journey times were to be halves, as well as making life easier for locomotive crews.
rest easy
▪
Craig Chalmers, however, can rest easy.
▪
He also seems to want to be the Nineties Coco Chanel, so street fashion bods can rest easy.
▪
He can rest easy on that matter.
▪
No side can rest easy with such a slender lead.
▪
Some local retailer would rest easy in his bed that night.
▪
Surely, the letter said with a surprising burst of bitterness, Eileen Ryan would rest easy in her grave at last.
▪
Wall Street and the bond markets can rest easy.
▪
When I have a shoal of feeding bream in the swim I can not rest easy.
sb can breathe easy/easily
sb can sleep easy
within (easy) reach of sth
▪
Also within easy reach of many places of interest, including the new International Convention Centre.
▪
It was so away from it all yet within easy reach of the city.
▪
None of the androids flew within reach of the weapon.
▪
That victory put him within reach of the top ten.
▪
The latter were concentrated quite markedly in Stratford and Forest Gate within easy reach of the main railway line into the city.
▪
The science-room windows were within easy reach of the school keeper's shammy.
▪
Weldon is within easy reach of major towns like Leicester, Peterborough and Northampton.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪
All the instructions are in large print to make them easy to read.
▪
Being a teacher isn't easy .
▪
He doesn't find it easy to talk about his personal feelings.
▪
He has lived an easy life in college for the last few years.
▪
I think Paul's had a pretty easy life.
▪
It's an easy journey - we just drive to the station, then take the direct train to Paris.
▪
It is easy to see why she didn't marry him.
▪
Lawyers really have it easy -- lots of money for very little work.
▪
Mr. Taylor is an easy teacher.
▪
Ms. Morrell is a small woman with a soft voice and an easy smile.
▪
Susan's always found school work easy .
▪
The questions were really easy .
▪
There's no easy way to solve this problem.
▪
This is not an easy time to be traveling.
▪
Was it easy for you to find a job?
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪
As on Suilven, the ridge dips to an easy saddle and rises to an east top.
▪
It was easy to see that he was clever and well read, but he was also boring.
▪
Microsoft is a longer name, yet still easy to pronounce, and described the software product perfectly.
▪
The Bit Shot is also quiet, lightweight and easy to handle.
▪
The Merrimac laid off at easy point-blank range, discharging her broadsides alternately at the Cumberland and the Congress.
▪
This is of course very easy since what the spreadsheet has stored in cells C and D is a time serial number.
▪
With the use of oil as a transport fuel for cars, things are not so easy .
II. adverb
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ VERB
come
▪
Fear comes easy: understanding is more difficult.
▪
Redford played a character where everything came easy .
▪
But my attitude to money is slightly easy come , easy go.
▪
Nothing has come easy for the 49ers this year, but the coaching decisions Sunday made the game unnecessarily difficult.
▪
Hands are not so easy come by for a slaver.
▪
Such pragmatism has not come easy to liberals.
▪
Laissez faire! Easy come , easy go!
▪
Again, academic success came easy , bud this time I was really interested.
go
▪
I stumbled across one shack, but was lucky this farmer was easy going .
▪
They tend to be more easy going and popular, and take more risks, but they can remain insecure and vulnerable.
▪
No easy come, easy go , in this house!
▪
He seemed to thrive under prison conditions, which caused the emperors to suspect their guards of going easy on the prisoner.
▪
But my attitude to money is slightly easy come, easy go .
▪
And go easy on the sugar, salt and alcohol.
▪
Tempting as the warm, crusty sourdough bread is, go easy .
▪
We went easy on Baker and gave him the benefit of the doubt.
rest
▪
No side can rest easy with such a slender lead.
▪
Wall Street and the bond markets can rest easy .
PHRASES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
(just) that little bit better/easier etc
▪
We have put together a few of the most popular itineraries to help make your choice that little bit easier.
a rough/easy ride
▪
Any member on a committee to which Karl Barth belonged had a rough ride .
▪
But history says Bill Clinton may be in for a rough ride .
▪
Even after the Renaissance and the rebirth of learning had reached these shores ears were still having a rough ride .
▪
He cheered Tory backbenchers, but they predicted that the Chancellor could also face a rough ride unless the plan works.
▪
Well, it's turned out not so badly, he thought, although it's been a rough ride .
a soft/easy touch
▪
And he knew I was a soft touch , that I did most of the housework so he could be free.
▪
Artisans needed more than just fertile imaginations and a soft touch with a trowel to bring their work to life.
▪
Cool for Cats at Stennis Head - a soft touch E15b.
▪
Leeds are a soft touch when it comes to transfers.
▪
Middlesbrough showed a resilience that emphasised they are no longer a soft touch on their travels.
▪
My client was a soft touch .
▪
Next to it goes a soft touch 6a, Cocoluche, which has an easily avoidable 6b section.
▪
Terry was such a soft touch .
all the better/easier/more etc
▪
He offsets Roberts' operatic evil with a performance that commands all the more notice for its minimalism.
▪
His job was made all the more easier by drivers who hadn't bothered to take measures to stop people like him.
▪
If there is some meat left on the bones, all the better.
▪
It makes it all the more opportune.
▪
Superb defence by Karpov, all the more praiseworthy in that he was now in desperate time trouble.
▪
The dispute was all the more bitter because a prize was at stake.
▪
The inadequacy and treachery of the old leaderships of the working class have made the need all the more imperative.
▪
Weather experts say it was a relatively dry winter which makes the water recovery all the more remarkable.
be a good/quick/easy etc lay
▪
I don't deny it was a good lay .
be easy meat
▪
If her own mind could play tricks like that, she'd be easy meat for any of those giant prawns.
▪
If we think they are easy meat we will end up with egg on our faces.
▪
Quakers were easy meat at home.
▪
Unprotected by a shell, they are easy meat for insect larvae and flatworms.
▪
With most of the control surfaces shot away, they were easy meat for a Messerschmitt.
easy option
▪
Instead of working to keep their marriages, more and more people are taking the easy option and getting divorced.
▪
Some people think that studying languages instead of sciences is a soft option .
▪
But their other argument is possibly more persuasive: it's that farm saving is not an easy option .
▪
His refusal to take the easy option is admirable.
▪
In a situation of this sort ignorance is often the easy option .
▪
It is, though, an easy option for simple Web pages.
▪
Promising extra money, though welcome in itself, is the easy option .
▪
They have no dislike of getting their feet wet, while preferring to stay dry where the easy option exists.
▪
Trotting is very pleasant, but it's not an easy option .
▪
Well, he certainly achieved it but remember, winning championships is the easy option .
easy prey
▪
It is easy prey - I've caught them myself.
▪
Like a wolf pack scenting easy prey , they dismounted and spread out.
▪
Men prowled the motel like packs of wolves searching out easy prey .
▪
More rarely, I watched them diving in the sea for sea urchins or other easy prey .
▪
The dams also render the animals easy prey for hunters and trap them when the water is drained for irrigation.
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Then, as the softies were driven extinct, Harrington followed them, having no easy prey left.
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Three groups are easy prey to the underclass's recruiting sergeant.
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We were barely moving through the water, an easy prey .
free and easy
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a free and easy lifestyle
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A free and easy smile, but lop-sided because her face was still puffy from Garty's beating.
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Cousin Noreen was arriving on Sunday and life wasn't going to be so free and easy after that.
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Gone was the free and easy time of three meals a day and as many hot drinks as we liked.
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In this free and easy style, I accustomed myself to the rhythms of school life.
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It was as if they were indeed from another world: a happy world, a free and easy world.
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Robyn remembered his free and easy hand as he had poured her wine.
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The time they shared became special now, where before they had been free and easy.
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Their relationship is not free and easy but at least Red is no longer looking daggers at her.
it's as easy as falling off a log
make life difficult/easier etc
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But this arbitrary division of the country has not made life easier for either the North or the South.
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Having to adopt the fast-track method made life difficult for all three.
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Jim was uninterested in learning the kind of ecclesial footwork that would have made life easier for himself and his parish.
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Latecomers, however, do make life difficult - and unnecessarily expensive.
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The lack of economic statistics has made life difficult for economists and money managers for the past few weeks.
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There's no greater pleasure than handing over money to a local supplier who helps make life easier.
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To make life easier in the future, will you be publishing an index?
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With the advent of electrics, journey times were to be halves, as well as making life easier for locomotive crews.
rest easy
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Craig Chalmers, however, can rest easy.
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He also seems to want to be the Nineties Coco Chanel, so street fashion bods can rest easy.
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He can rest easy on that matter.
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No side can rest easy with such a slender lead.
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Some local retailer would rest easy in his bed that night.
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Surely, the letter said with a surprising burst of bitterness, Eileen Ryan would rest easy in her grave at last.
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Wall Street and the bond markets can rest easy.
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When I have a shoal of feeding bream in the swim I can not rest easy.
sb can breathe easy/easily
sb can sleep easy
within (easy) reach of sth
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Also within easy reach of many places of interest, including the new International Convention Centre.
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It was so away from it all yet within easy reach of the city.
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None of the androids flew within reach of the weapon.
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That victory put him within reach of the top ten.
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The latter were concentrated quite markedly in Stratford and Forest Gate within easy reach of the main railway line into the city.
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The science-room windows were within easy reach of the school keeper's shammy.
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Weldon is within easy reach of major towns like Leicester, Peterborough and Northampton.