‘A’

OK I stand corrected. It just seems to me that a warning by its very nature has to come before the event. But I'm happy to be wrong. ?

I didn't hear the news, so I may have misunderstood you,Nanny27, but "prior" means "previous" and you can well be warned of something before it actually occurs, so no, I don't think "prior warning" is a tautology.

My pet hate is when people don't sound the letter T in the middle of a word. My eldest DD is called Natalie & the amount of people that call her Na-a-lie. Drives me insane! I always correct them & say its Na-Tuh-lie! Same with any word with the letter T in the middle, I will always correct DH, DD's & DGC!

I had an embarrassing moment with my son’s new Scottish OH. She rang and said ‘It’s Kee’ Well I don’t know any ‘Kees’. I finally got it after a few tries - her name is ‘Kay’ !

We have had this discussion before. I believe it is American usage to always pronounce the indefinite article "a" to rhyme with "hay".

As I child I was taught that pronouncing "a" to rhyme with "hay" was correct if you were emphasising something, as in "There is a (ay) pencil on the table, but I do not know if it is yours, or not"
Otherwise "a" should always be pronounced "ah" with a short a, as opposed to "aah", which is what I say when surprised.

Having been brought up in Scotland I say "Once upon a (ah) time, not uh time, but I am willing to believe that there are different ways of saying it in other parts of the British Isles.

The sound of my A is the way you say apple

Listening to the news last night about the demise of Thomas Cook and the passengers being brought back to the UK I lost count of the number of times I heard the phrase 'prior warning'. Seems somewhat like tautology to me. What do you think?

‘Pygmalion - pronounced success’

Press reviews of GB Shaw’s play highlighting the vagaries of English pronunciation and usage.
At which point most students of English would despair

Everyone these days seem to say must of and would of instead of must have. Also when we didn’t want to continue with a task etc it was because we were bored with it. That now seems to have become bored of. Annoys me or am I just old fashioned?

I've noticed winifred01, Robert Peston in particular says "thut".

I would have said: I for a bargain!

The one that annoys me is contra bute for contribute.Emphasis on trib.

Have you noticed people( even in TV and radio) say thut not that?

Oh I can't help it! Let's have the Cockney alphabet
A for 'Orses (Hay for Horses)
B for Mutton (Beef or Mutton)
C for Miles (See for Miles)
D for Ential (Differential)
E for Brick (Heave a Brick)
F for Vessence (Effervescence)
G for Get It (Gee, forget it!)
H for Retirement (Age for Retirement)
I for The Engine (Ivor the Engine)
J for Oranges (Jaffa Oranges)
K for Restaurant (Cafe or Restaurant)
L for Leather (Hell for Leather)
M for Sis (Emphasis)
N for Lope (Envelope)
O for The Garden Wall (Over the Garden Wall)
P for Relief (How do you spell relief)
Q for a Bus (Queue for a Bus)
R for Mo (Half a Moment)
S for As You Go (As Far As You Go)
T for Two (Tea for Two)
U for Me (You for Me)
V for La France (Vive la France)
W for the Winnings (Double you for the Winnings)
X for Breakfast (Eggs for Breakfast)
Y for Husband (Wife or Husband)
Z for Wind (Zephyr Wind)

Sorry Minerva, I pressed post instead of preview. I’m just off to see if our Satnav says A6 properly.
NotSpagetti -uh is correct instead of?

I like this thread - but as a fully certified pedant (my OH would certainly confirm this!) - the news broadcasts and programmes like 'Newsnight' seem to demonstrate a growing tendency to use slang and sloppy pronunciation as a matter of course. Maybe they're trying to 'get down wiv the kids.

Here's a couple I offer for comments:

Use of "train station" when it's a railway station

Starting a sentence with 'So', when trying to explain something.

Increased use of the American style of placing the stress on the first syllable of a word like presentation, and oddly by contrast on the last syllable with a word like debris.

There seems to be a trend - sorry but it appears to me as mostly people under the age of 35 to 40 - of that rising tone in the voice at the end of a statement or comment. A bit like a musical crescendo!

Minerva I love that. Will listen out next time we are driving down that way.

Uh is correct.

We drove down to the south coast a while back and were in stitches because the sat nav app on the phone recognised all the A roads as ‘uh’ as we travelled through London. For example ‘At the next junction take the first exit on to the uh 316’.

Mysteriously, once we reached the M25 this ceased to happen and the A in A23 became Ai.

On the return journey there was a prize for the first person to notice the ‘uh’

It might be regional. I say once upon ‘a’ time - rhymes with the a in cat not u in hut. I find I say A (rhymes with a in hay) is saved for times when it has to sound important e.g. Do you have A REASON for doing that to your maths book?

Glad someone has commented on this. I've noticed it for ages & it really bugs me. Something like this happened years ago when people ended their sentence as if it were a question. (Similar to Aussies.) Why????

I never say Uh . You do not say Uh pair of socks , maybe it is a dialect thing? I have been known to say Huh in a bad mood ?

Agree about emphasis on unimportant words, esp. re weather forecasters and their - 'more rain IN the south-west'.
Will watch out for 'Ai'. Agree re 'uh', but always thought it was a southern pronunciation.

When you say "once upon a time", you don't say Ah you say uh. Don't you say Ah, when someone tells you something you didn't know?
I know what you mean Lizzie, it annoys me too. They seem to be putting emphasis on an unimportant word.

Ah - I think it is.