The English Language

I got this idea from Nytro about how weird our language is. First of all, half the words in English are pronounced entirely different than the way it's spelled. If English weren't my first language, I'd probably try to learn how to write with my feet before trying to learn English.

So, I've been some places in my life, lived in some different countries, heard some variations of the English language. It's a wonder I can even speak at all considering the confusion I went through as a child. While living in Oman I attended a British school, the American school had yet to be built. So I hung out with Brits and guess what happened???? I HAD A BRITISH ACCENT UNTIL I WAS 10. Then my dear friends, THEN, we moved to Oklahoma where it was pointed out to me daily that I said mummy instead of mommy. This came as an utter shock to me because according to the Brits, I had an American accent. They made fun of the way I said tomato and potatoe. According to them it should be said po-TAH-to and to-MAH-to. Weirdos.

So, while in Oklahoma I had to adjust, and slowly developed a small southern drawl. Just as my poor brain got used to that particular type of dialect, we moved to South America. Luckily they didn't speak English down there, and this time I would have a legitimate excuse as to why my Spanish speaking had an accent. But even still, the few Americans who lived there still made fun of the fact that I had an "Oklahoma" accent. Geez people! Leave me alone!

After South America, it was back to Oklahoma. But my sister moved to Utah to go to college where she constantly pointed out the fact that I had an Okie accent. Not helping my problem, I too moved to Utah to go to college. Luckily I befriended some people from South Carolina who's accents were WAY stronger than mine. "Howdy y'all!" And once again, I didn't help my problem by transfering to Texas. No, the people down yonder didn't notice an accent, but they sure did help increase it. Oh the torture from my family! Let me just defend the southerners for a moment and proclaim that it is MUCH easier to say "y'all" than "you all" or "you guys."

So right now I have no idea if I have an accent or not. Living in Utah, I really hope I don't have a Utah accent. For example:
Words such as fork, corn, ward, born are pronounced like you would say "are" (fark, carn, ward, barn).
The word mountain is used quite often, the pronounciation on the other hand is more like "MOU-in" excluding the N and T. My sister has a friend named Linton (Utah names is a whole other post). Most people here pronouce this name Lih-in.

In Oklahoma people say crayon like crown, they call hills mountains and they pronouce the word zion, ZI-ohn instead of zion like lion.

Texas people, don't even get me started. They also mis-pronounce zion, say "fixin' to," and also "smell of it," NO PEOPLE, you don't smell OF something, you smell something.

So, as you can see, I'm totally screwed up when it comes to pronoucing things, or using the correct grammer. I still get confused when I have to spell colour and aeroplane.

** Update on my co-worker from hell. Apparently God made her perfect and forgot to tell the rest of us that Jesus wasn't the only perfect person to exist on this planet. We're celebrating August birthdays on Friday, and hers happens to be one of them. She refused to agree on a cake with anyone, so we had to order EXACTLY what she wanted or she didn't want to celebrate her birthday. It's called compromise you spoiled piece of crap!