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It’s a Good Thing He Doesn’t Lisp
Brandon had a news conference of sorts today. It was great standup comedy though it shouldn’t have been. It was about the Omicron variant of Covid. But … was it?
Brandon started off with this line. “When I was elected, I said I would always be honest with you.”
He had me laughing from the beginning.
In the next sentence, he told us that the new variant was the OmNicron. Not Omicron. Has someone changed the Greek alphabet? Is Omicron too gender-specific or racist? With everything else these woke fools are doing, they may have. I just didn’t get the memo.
But Brandon then mispronounced it several more times in the course of his standup routine.
I know, he’s old. He’s always been mentally slow and is slower now. Crazy Brandon, right?
But then Brandon calls on St. Anthony to make a pronouncement. And St. Anthony pronounces it OmNicron as well.
What? Is dementia catchable? Evidently.
So, I’m laughing at these people.
Then, Brandon allows certain members of the press sycophancy in a no doubt pre-rehearsed manner to ask questions. And sure enough, it’s OmNicron again.
After that, I’m just glad Brandon doesn’t have a lisp. Yet.
Published in Humor
Sorry, I meant before a consonant. Guess I shouldn’t be criticizing the British over linguistics!
Now that was Elmer Fudd!
But it’s true. The reduce their Rs before a vowel, too. But I see your point.
He’s a Brit isn’t he.
I get the idea that he is a Bostonian. They can’t pronounce “r” either.
This ‘r’ thing is a distinction called ‘rhoticity’, about which much has been written.
Have you ever heard how the French and Israelis pronounce their “R’s?” It’s like a growl.
That ‘r in the throat’ is noted as a phase that the rhotic r went through in some parts of Britain on the way to disappearing completely.
I read about this some when I was looking for sources on RP: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhoticity_in_English
Rs are tricky. Americans do pretty well with them, but the rest of the world – except pirates – has a hard time. Same with th. We th all over the place without thinking about it, but it’s a pain for large parts of the world.
My German girlfriend is always slowing down to insert a tortured th when it crops up. “Clothes” is a regular – the th is a stumbler, and the strange plural always confuses. She eventually comes out with something like “closes”, which is pretty damn charming with a German accent. So I have adopted it as the most-preferred pronunciation. Especially if it’s “take off your closes”.
Whenever I mistype tink for think, I think about leaving it as it is, because I think tink is a real word elsewhere in the world.
If you get my trust.