Mis-Pronunciation

In honour of the amazing sharky, aka, Clare, I've decided to write a blog on some of the stupid moments of my life. Most of one happens to be my mis-pronunciation of SO. MANY. WORDS.

Sadly, I can't actually blame my deafness for this. I've been corrected so many times that my sister has basically complied a mental list of all the words I say wrong and has basically given up on correcting me, because I have the memory space of a gnat. The problem I have, is that I like to pronounce stuff the way it's spelt. Unfortunately speaking like this means I sound like a mentalist and shouldn't be allowed out in public.

Fajitias 
I can't order these in a restaurant because no one knows what I mean when I say 'fa-jee-tas' But can't you see the innocent mistake?! It shouldn't have to be so finicky to pronounce

Natural
There's some sort of stupid way to say this word apparently, and 'nat-ur-al' isn't correct. Why is the british language so ridiculous?

Sele
This one is totally justified in getting wrong. There's a park in Hexham where I spend most of my time terrifying small children, and whilst its called the Sele, it's pronounced 'Seal'. So when I was 14, asking my mother to drop me off at the 'sele' (and pronouncing it 'selly' which looks like how it SHOULD be said) entrance, my sister had no idea what I meant until I explained 'Y'know, the big park thing. Over there'. The laughing fit that followed looked like it was enough to snap a rib.

Anatomy
Apparently asking to watch Greys 'anna-toe-me' isn't a programme and resulted in at least 10 minutes of my mother and sister teaching me how to correctly pronounce anatomy. I still can't remember how.

Gloucester
Gem will appreciate this one... It's only recently that I've been told that its said 'Gloster', and to think of the little rhyme that went 'Dr Foster went to Gloucester'. I was actually pronouncing it 'Glou-chester' which meant that when trying to explain to people where Gem lived, resulted in confused faces and them probably thinking that I was making her up... I still have a problem remembering the correct way but then I just remember that handy rhyme.

Hermionie
I cannot be the only person who pronounced her name wrong whilst reading the Harry Potter books when I was younger. I think I said 'Her-min-y' which confused my gran when I tried to talk to her about the 3rd book and she had no idea who I was talking about. Apparently, its a common thing (maybe not specifically with my version of pronunciation though) so good old J.K slipped in how to correctly pronounce her name in the 4th book when she was talking to a foreign student who couldn't seem to get it right. In fairness, I have a habit of reading things fast and mixing up the letters, and spent several books reading the caretakers name, who is actually called Filch, as 'Flitch'. I may have also spent the entire 3rd book thinking Sirius Black's name was actually 'Serious'. Note to self: Read slower.

I'm aware this doesn't help my case when I previously tried to point out that I'm not actually thick, but I've decided, who cares, having a more relaxed and happier outlook on things (especially if you lead a highly embarrassing moment filled life) is much more important than what people do or do not think of you. Also, that's only a tiny handful of the words I can't say properly, there's a tonne more, believe me, but cos I tried to think of them, naturally, they all just seemed to vanish out of my mind.

I'll miss you Clare. Your funny stories, your sharky love, and your general wackyness that will in no way be matched by anyone X X X X