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Uncle Marvo · 14-09-2006, 05:35 PM posted to uk.rec.gardening

In reply to La Puce ) who wrote this in
, I, Marvo, say :

Uncle Marvo wrote:
My French friend STILL can't work out the plural of "sheep", and
he's been here for nearly ten years :-)

I can't either after 25 years, that's why I wrote moutons. I also have
tricks with unpronounciable pronounciation: I stay well away from the
word sheet and I have a variety of words which plurial should be
obvious, like hairs, foots ... as for 'h' sounds, well, I 'ave still
to master this 'has' I put them w'h'ere zey shouldn't be. The word
'thoroughly' is frankly a joke and 'ch' and 'sh' is a waste of time
and effort as far as I am concerned. The words describing a boat and a
mouton I find like your friend particularly tricky.

We're getting our own back for those wicked words you have with only vowels
in them. Vowels and X's. Like Aix. You know, of course, the trick of
pronouncing them with your fingers in your ears so you sound to yourself
like you sound to everyone else?

ch, th, and sh are all pronounced "s". Unless you're Spanish :-)

A boat? The plural of boat is boats. And they are all female, unlike your
male bateau, and your bateaux.

The dogs in my life are the only ones who don't ask me to repeat.
Bless zem.

Pardon?