There’s an accent meme going around at the moment, but I’m not doing it, I can’t be bothered. It did remind me however (and this may give some small clue as to the way I talk) that German girl spent years believing that when I really, really didn’t want to do something, that I didn’t even want to be questioned about doing it. Oh, how we laughed when I finally explained that there was no ‘k’, no, not even silent, in there - in fact I wasn’t even saying ‘asked’. I tell you, the long winter evenings used to fly by…. But that’s because we had a large screen tv, a huge movie collection and other, more interesting friends.
Sometimes we’d even go out and play that game/sport/pastime that’s a little like skittles, but on a large scale and considered quite American: “Tempting” bowling.
Song playing as this was published: Ben Folds - “Bitches Ain’t Shit”
You obviously speak The Queen’s English. I wish *I* could use the alternative to “I can’t be bothered”, but with my accent, it just sounds silly.
christina: Ah, yes, I is all wot they call posh and stuff….
You’ve become gradually less hugh granty posh, but I think that’s in response to me saying “frightfully” and “awfully” a lot, and calling it “parsive aggressive”.
INOAP: Ha! Ha! But you only speak like that because you’re Scottish.
No, I can’t. Can I? Make a joke at my beloved’s expense? How he confused the words ’shrimp’ and ’shrink’? Don’t tell him I told you.
Shame you won’t record yourself. I’d like to hear posh ‘Anley.
BiB: I’ll not say a word to him. Although I’m curious about the activity of shrimping now, obviously. And all those e-mails I keep receiving with Russian return addresses are about seafood it would seem.
Actually, I don’t think I sound that different from TEFL Smiler. I’m from Durham and then moved ‘down South’. I have some Northern vowels, I suppose, but there’s nothing more pleasing than being in ‘Anley - no, wait for me to finish - there’s nothing more pleasing than being in ‘Anley and being asked where one is from ‘yü posh Southern fück.’ - I can’t even fake that accent.
Stöök does lend itself to the umlaut rather well, doesn’t it?
What I forgot to mention last time, and which is a variation on a theme, actually, is an old lady I know who tries to remain at the cutting edge of the linguistic latest and learnt the words ‘miffed’ and ‘chuffed’ and then proceeded to use them the wrong way round, to great comic effect.
Shrink was a game I played with some Danes. Don’t know if it’s Danish. David? At various junctures, the word ‘Shrink’ has to be hollered, but my beloved got the wrong end of the stick and shouted ‘Shrimp’ instead, with gusto. Bit of a hoot.
My husband confuses bagels with beagles.
Christina: It’s an easy mistake to make. Many’s the time I’ve found myself smearing dogs with cream cheese, smoked salmon and a sprig of dill.
BiB: I have had a similar experience. My old boss said I must be muffed once. I didn’t sue.
Smearing dogs with cream cheese….Is that how Mr Fact is passing the time nowdays?? I’m sure it’s just a passing fad and once he gets more stable in life, he’ll look back laugh. Actually, I have the opposite problem, I keep trying to force the beagle into the toaster (and not because I’m confused) (PETA disclaimer: No animals have really been hurt in my toaster - yet)
820: Smoking Beagles. Yes, we’re both scientists and know that ’s something different….
Oh go on, Mr Fact - record thisen!
Never heard of that, BiB - but I’m hardly an expert on all things Danish. Nowadays I live in my own mainly expat world, meeting the locals only when drink or work is involved.
As for ways of saying ‘I can’t be bothered’ - imagine the surprise on a Danish student’s face when I first moved here and was speaking English. One day he asked me why I didn’t want to do something (I can’t remember what). How he laughed when I replied, quite automatically: “I can’t be fucked”. His understanding of this unknown phrase was at first very literal! And he literally fell off his chair and rolled about on the floor in stitches of laughter - seriously!!!
So how are we supposed to pronounce ‘picturesque’? I always worry about the pronunciation of ‘pronounce’.
And one for the comically misheard pile: all intensive purposes.
Admittedly that’s one of many, but then it’s probably genetic as my brother could never understand why one put a cloth over a carrot to make it be quiet.
I would continue the meme, but that might involve working out how to record mp3s using only earphones plugged into the wrong slot. Actually if I just shout at the speakers, that’ll work, right?
Am I the only English speaker who is very much concerned with the fact that the people from northern Europe (Sweden, Iceland, Norway…) speak better English than we natives do - and with no accent ? I watch the news when they interview someone off the street from Norway who says things like “and when one accounts for the inflationary spending of said nation …” I find it very concerning indeed.
820: But they live off whale blubber!
I’ve seen National Geographic, I know the truth.
Anyway, I did one of those “which American accent do you have?” tests and it came up with Minnessota. And that’s basically Nordics speaking English, right? (or “eh?” if I move a little further north).
The truth is that as far as accents go (at least American) I have none. None, not a trace..and I am from Missississippi. That makes peoples heads spin. Usually the converstion goes like this- “Your from Mississippi? you don’t sound like what I’ve heard in the movies”. My response is “This is how we speak..now go fuck off”. I said I didn’t have an accent, I didn’t say I was polite.
BTW, evidently you can put in as many iss in Mississippi as you like. I do know how to spell my own state, I just get overly enthusiastic about my typing.
My beloved used to have a problem with Pronunciation. For love nor money I could never find Darwins The oranges of Species. She’s pretty flawless now though, and has wonderful time ripping the piss out of me when I verbally butcher German.
“the long winter evenings used to fly by”: do I spot a quote from “Blackadder”?
Anyhoo: If one had never heard the word picturesque spoken, and only seen it written, it might be pronounced something like this:
Hmm. That’s neatly written.
820: And you are a product of the education system of that great state?
Actually, the nearest city to “here” produces schoolchildren, at least 20% of whom are “functionally illiterate” - and look at the spelling and grammar in this blog - so I’ll shut up.
Devonboy: Ah, but how’s her sense of humour coming along? You should have seen the Christmas card she sent me. Did you help her pick it? She put an “x” on it and I presume it was meant to be “your mark” rather than a kiss.
Hannah Banana: No, no. It was a completely original thought. Who is this “Blackadder” of whom you speak?
Was it a very shakey X, the kind that looks like someone sneezed on the card?
Does “sneezed” really need 3 E’s?
English is a living, developing language with no hard and fast rules but yes, it does.
This message has been deemed unsuitable for readers.
I like your IPA. And your pure brewed.
INOAP: That’s linguist humour, isn’t it? It took me a while to work it out though….
Streets: Unsuitable reply. By the way - my phone just ran out of credit, I can’t text.
David: I got my dictaphone out to record a message and then transfer it to the computer (microphone? Pah!) and have spent hours listening to all the nonsense on it.
That’s ok. Will you be around though?
Streets: I shall be around - around Glasgow.
Die können alles - außer Hochdeutsch.
Your future’s bright!
Sorry, but I was shocked to discover that my bankruptcy fairy has had the audacity to go round telling other people how broke they are. I shall dismiss her forthwith to let her spend her days huddled under some bridge over-enunciating incoherently at all who pass, unable to finish begging for food without adding a brusque “goodbye” to every sentence.
And is that funny bunch of symbols written in your fair hand? Or your brown with a slightly reddish tinge or whatever hand?
Truth is that for me it was private school in Florida from kindergarden through high school. I just don’t point that out when I tell people I’m from MS. It’s too much fun screwing with them.
On a different topic: What kind of crap is the BBC (and picked up by CNN) reporting these days?
LONDON, England (AP) — New DNA evidence proves the driver of Princess Diana’s car was drunk on the night of her fatal crash in a Paris underpass in 1997, the British Broadcasting Corp. reported Saturday.
820: There’s a region on chromosome 14 that specifically binds ethanol molecules, why this effect, commonly used in modern forensic science, only occurs in the nuclei of red blood cells is still a mystery to scientists - a spokesman for the BBC might have said.
And we call those public schools to screw with the rest of the English-speaking world.
Anyhoo: The future’s bright, the future involves a conversation with a man with an extremely heavy Indian accent called ‘Colin’ at the (no, no we’ve not outsourced) callcentre. “What is the weather there like where you are?” he asks, “Low 90s” I reply.
“Oh, it’s like that here”
“And where abouts is ‘here’?”
“Norwich”
It’s not the hypocrisy, it’s that after I spoke to him, I got put back to your bankruptcy fairy; “I’m just putting that through….. Still putting that through…. I used to work as a continuity announcer at the BBC in the 1950s…. still putting that through……”
And it is my blemished hand. Next time I will write properly, install the correct fonts or just say, “you know, like picture-skew.”
The Streets: Actually, maybe Glaswegians could adapt that slogan. “We can do anything, just not speak proper English.”
“By the way - my phone just ran out of credit, I can’t text.” - You are mad, you are.