Andy is from up North which means he pronounces words like 'bath', 'grass' and 'castle' funny. Denise is from down South, which means she pronounces words like 'bath', 'grass' and 'castle' correctly.Obviously, Andy and Denise have many discussions about what is 'right' and 'wrong' when it comes to pronunciation but Denise reckons she is winning Andy round gradually. He does suffer from bees in his ears which means progress can be slow - but overall his linguistic training programme is moving at a satisfactory pace.
Andy maintains, also, that people from down South all look the same. There is a 'Kentish' look apparently, which he can't quite put his finger on. Denise has tried prompting him - seven toes on each foot maybe? Purple hair? A tendency to laugh uncontrollably at DIY SOS? No, she discovers last night, it is ears. People from Kent, according to Andy, all have an 'extra' ear inside their 'normal' ear ('normal' in this case refers to the up North standard.) So to prove a point, Andy takes photos of his ear, then Denise's ear as Denise hasn't got a clue what Andy is on about. To be honest, she thinks it's a bit rich coming from someone who has bees in his ears. Comparing the two photos, Denise has to concede that, yes, she can see that the ridge inside her ear could potentially collect more water than Andy's if they were both lying in the garden on their sides during a monsoon. And now she is paranoid about her ears which, up to last night, had been one of the favourite and least troublesome parts of her body i.e they've never been fat.
However, Denise supposes things could be worse for her in the ear stakes. Apparently, Davey Crocket had a wild front ear. Bet that was difficult to cover up with a hair do.
Now you know that the ear thing isn't a generic 'southern' trait but just your family.
ReplyDeleteThough I maintain there is a Kent look (which is nothing like the Innsmouth look, thankfully)