My favorite mispronunciation comes from when I was working at a press clipping service, listening to a broadcast out of New York that was reading the papers for the blind. It took me the darnedest time to figure out that the MO-jayv Desert they were referring to was that big place to the south of me, the Mojave. It's been so long since I've been in an area that isn't saturated with Spanish influence that I forgot people don't know how to pronounce Spanish words. I have also met women whose names are spelled Wanita.

When I was three I'd sometimes tag along when M had things to do, and during storytime I'd park myself at her shoulder and read along. And occasionally correct her. "That word's not 'mare', Jude-a-Murph, it's 'may-or'."

I am completely charmed by Jude-a-Murph as a name.

I thought dilemma was dilemna for the longest time, and pronounced it that way. It's only the etymology that keeps me honest these days.

I probably would have garbled segue, except that it was one of the few words I remember hearing before seeing. I hung out with radio people in college who would punch from station to station just to hear the segueways between songs. In my youth, 50 minutes of music every hour would have constituted the dreadful sin of dead segueing. I miss someone telling me what the song is, and I would like to whack someone with my cane about it.

My theory is that any commonly used regional pronunciation is not wrong, and place names are pronounced the way the people who live there pronounce them. I'm not really eager for the day when we all talk like the man on the 6 o'clock news.

the segueways

I was just about to cite this as the biggest argument I got into about spelling/pronunciation in university. K just wouldn't accept that it would be pronounced segwayway. For someone who knew French, I just didn't get it.

Schuykill, Conshohocken, Bala Cynwyd, Manayunk, Gladwyne... growing up in Philly will mess you up.

I can pronounce all of these correctly!

I still have a lot of words I can spell but not say, but can't think of them right now.

I was just using my new iPod touch to try and take a video of my cat in one of her frequent meowing moments, but she immediately shut up as soon as I turned the thing on. Then, I switched the cameras to see what I look like in motion. OMG, my sister was right--I look a hell of a lot like my Grandma A!! Here's hoping that more weight loss will remove the flap of fat in the middle of my neck, and the hair coloring I'm planning on doing next month will make me look a lot younger.

Frappe. I pronounced it "frap."

Colonel "CALL-o-nel"

chauffeur (in a Trixie Belden book!) -- CHAAFER

And England was an nightmare the first month:

The "THAMES" = Tymes

LESTER Square I said LIEchester (for Leicester)

GLOSTERshyre for GLOSSteshure (Gloustershire)

WorCHEST-er-shyre for WOOSteshure(Worchestershire)

Frappe. I pronounced it "frap."

That's how it's pronounced! If you're talking about a thick ice cream shake in New England, anyway.

I think I just realised that my family pronounces the sauce Worchester as Wistasheer because of a combined Massachusetts/Rochester accent