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OK, waiting for the explosion...nothing happening yet..waiting....

I did notice, reading through the raving and ranting- he was contradictory and evidently didn't even notice it. So determined to make his case that he didn't notice that one example said the opposite. Oh well.

But in case anyone else would like a good laugh, check out this explanation for the term 'bollocks'. I didn't know:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bollocks

 

Edited part: I just have to mention the last two lines of the above link. Next to last, "People really do talk like this." And then, "Due to its versatility, bollocks has been called the Swiss Army Knife of andrological profanities."

Some things really are priceless and I thank the English for this one.:)(This message has been edited by packsaddle)

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My wife grew up in Brooklyn and Long Island, and while she was at medical school she went and worked for a time in a small town in North Carolina. There were people there who she could not understand at all. She essentially had to get their speech translated. (Whether they could understand her, I don't know.)

 

I had the same experience in Scotland--the people were very friendly, but sometimes hard to understand. (Maybe they only SEEMED friendly--who knows what they were actually saying?)

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My Mum lived 40 years in London but never lost her Irish accent, while it's hard for me to judge I think my Dads accent softened a little.

What gets me is that I'm unaware that I have an accent, I'm unaware that the people in the area that I live have an accent, but now when I go home to London, I'm aware that they have an accent.

Eamonn.

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Hunt, heh, heh, I had the same experience. My wife moved down here from up north and after a few weeks, she confided to me that she had had several conversations with neighbors and she had no idea what they had said. I had to admit that even I, a native, sometimes had the same feeling. But she had a sense of humor at least (or else she wouldn't have married me).;)

I had a student who moved here from Pennsylvania (as I remember). He and his wife visited in April and thought it was lovely. They rented a mobile home and arrived in August. After a month or so, he announced that they were leaving. He had come home and she was sitting on the steps in tears. Mangy dogs, dirty kids, gunshots in the woods around them, and August heat...she cried and said that he had brought her to hell. And to her I suppose it was. I felt sad for them both.

 

There was a delightful program on public TV years ago. It was called 'American Tongues' and it was a hoot! Everyone around the country with their accents thought they sounded exactly the way everyone else did. And there were some doozies. If you can find it, it's worth a watch.

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We've had mums in our yard for about 20 years and they are beautiful this year-we've never used Acc'ent seasoning on them but if it works-great. We usually use Acc'ent on the meat and the folks recite things like

"M r duks"

"M r not"

"M r 2- c dem iddie biddie feet?"

"L i b M r duks."

 

Maybe the more we talk to each other the less we understand one another. :)

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This one used to drive me bonkers!!

 

I know a ditty nutty as a fruitcake Goofy as a goon and silly as a loon Some call it pretty others call it crazy but they all sing this tune:

Mairzy Doats And Dozy Doats and liddle lamzy divey A kiddley divey too, wouldn't you? Yes! Mairzy doats And Dozy Doats and liddle lamzy divey A kiddley divey too, wouldn't you? If the words sound queer, and funny to your ear, a little bit jumbled and jivey, Sing "Mares eat oats and does eat oats and little lambs eat ivy" Oh! Mairzy Doats and Dozy Doats and liddle lamzy divey A kiddley divey too, wouldn't you - oo? A kiddley divey too, wouldn't you?

 

Illiud Latine dici non potest !!

Eamonn

Unless of course the Nuns where OGE went to school did a better job than those at Holy Cross.

Die dulci fruere.

(This message has been edited by Eamonn)

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