Rugged Rascal Running around Rugged Rocks

When I was a teenager my Mother sent me for Elocution lessons every week ( ok, l hear you hadn’t noticed ). Pronouncing words properly was key though ‘ The Leith Police Dissmisseth us ‘ always got me but not as bad as ‘ the rugged rascals ran around the rugged rocks ‘. Language I found is about vocabulary not so much pronunciation and I’m still yet to know all the 171,476 words that fill the Oxford Dictionary.

I was shamed by again on Friday when a German friend whose vocabulary is as wide as Bavaria referred to a canard which I had never heard of and from my French days thought was a duck. Alas he told me that it was an unfounded statement or known from American origin as fake news.

Now I do know that the Americans love my accent as every time I speak there they smile ( no not because of the Boston Tea Party ). One lady from the famous Hunt family told me in Dallas that she loved my voice so much she wanted to take me home. ( swinging on a perch in a gilded cage on South Fork ) however did not appeal. My word for lift not elevator they laughed at and the expression choc a bloc brought the house down.

Louis Armstrong ( who sent me a congratulatory telegram to my wedding ), no I’m not blowing my own trumpet sang with Ella Fitzgerald the classic song on pronunciation twixt English and American English addresses a few words of distinction but somehow we get there in the end. I do know that our use of the word ‘ brilliant ‘ annoys the Yanks as does their word ‘ awesome ‘ annoy the Brits.

Anyway all I know is that it’s brilliant weather in England today, a fine Sunday and that day of rest is going to be awesome. With the American election coming up in two months we are going to have a lot more canard served up so watch out for that and hopefully I’ll broaden my vocabulary and catch out my German friend one day but better not that might be just pure schadenfreude on my part.

Yes the rugged rascal is still running around the rugged rocks. Can’t help it.