Past Simple or Past Continuous

[Marionetta]

Hello,

I would like to ask the following:

A: What did you do at the weekend?
B: Not much. On Saturday I was cleaning up the house and on Sunday afternoon I was relaxing.

Is it correct to use the Past Continuous in this situation, when we refer to a time period not a point in time (Yesterday at 5 o´clock I was having a coffee.) Shouldn´t the Past Simple be used instead or it doesn´t matter?

thank you

[Alan]

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Hi Marionetta,

The Past Simple is essentially a tense describing what happened at a particular time in the past and is regarded as a 'completed' event. The Past Continuous is used with the idea of describing that event, in a way giving the reader a picture of the event. In your sentences the Past Continuous is certainly correct.

Alan
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English as a Second Language
You can read my ESL story Present Simple