Sat or sitting when speaking or writing.

The short 'uh' sound for 'e' or 'a' is often mentioned on this forum. I think it's old fashioned speech (a bit like dropping final g) or dialect rather than lazy speaking. Do people fully pronounce the 'e' in a word like magnet, for example, or the 'a' in I saw a dog. What's the difficulty here?

Point taken, Witzend.
However your examples show the Granny knows the difference between a present and a part participle.

Your Irish friend neatly side- steps past tense. There must be a metaphysical implication of "I am just after" as a way of describing the passage of time. Something to do with how Irish Friend remains the same essence through different modifications.

OTOH I do rather like some quirks of dialect.
An extremely good tutor we had when I was doing a TEFL course abroad, said her Scottish granny always said, ‘I should have went…’. instead of ‘should have gone…’
And an Irish friend would often say she was ‘just after’ doing something, meaning she’d just done it.
Despite being a grumpy old pedant, I do like a lot of such quirks.

Do serious speakers ever misuse English past participles? I mean people like Jim Al-Khalili, Andrew Marr, the Pope, even Boris Johnson.

It is possible to speak when sitting, or when standing, but writing whilst standing may require a clip board to be used

Can I GET ( as in a cup of coffee etc etc ) instead of please may I have ☹️?

Oh well I opened a can of worms then.

Agree with all the above sources of aggravation. The (mainly Yorkshire?) use of ‘were’ instead of ‘was’ (‘I were going to ...’) always grates (apologies to my Yorkshire ancestors if they said this), as do the misplacing/absence of apostrophes - e.g. ‘it’s’ rather than ‘its’ and vice versa, and saying ‘a.m.’/‘p.m.’ in addition to ‘morning/afternoon/evening’, a favourite of television reporters. My husband becomes very fed up ‘of’? my constant complaints when the television’s on!

I sat or I stood.
According to my DGD, I was sitting or I was standing is called the ‘past continuous’ tense.

I dislike reporting such as "It was claimed that X had been seeing several women on a TV documentary."
That sentence needs at least a comma or, preferably, to be completely rearranged.

Greta - We wouldn't say ”I was drunk” when we mean I was drinking”.

"I was drunk" ...images here of someone
(obviously would have to be a giant), in the act of drinking a person....

I've never heard that used here. Sat is used as the past tense of sit. Language is always evolving, but I must admit that it grates on my ears sometimes.

One of my mother's favourite expressions was "I was sat sitting there" and another was "I was stood standing there" She was very hot on grammar but she just enjoyed these two.

NanKate

Haitch instead of Aitch ?

Absolutely. There is no H at the beginning of Aitch. We were given aitch as a spelling when I was at school to make sure we got it right.

Haitch instead of Aitch ?

I don't think I was sat would ever be correct.
I was asked to sit.

Aks instead of ask is an interesting one.
Chaucer used it.
The first translation of the bible used it Ax and it shall be given

"Indians in South Africa, black Caribbeans, and African-Americans use "ax." Rickford says it's the empire striking back: taking language that has been imposed and making it your own". off the internet

Language evolves but it can still grate when you hear words mispronounced and worse if you read them.

I also get annoyed at people who say "he should of" instead of "he should have". One thing that often crops up in online forums is the use of "to" instead of "too"

I just hate harASSment!

I think it's dialect. Around here....or round here as we say....they and their/there is pronounced in the same way so that makes learning to write and spell the words even harder. The children mix them up til (yes not until) they learn it of by heart.

I once received a letter from a civil servant that included "We have no disgression in the matter."

!

The word 'disgression' [sic] should have been 'discretion'.

was sitting if the person was doing so when something else was going on.

He sat under the tree in the rain implies that he took shelter there.

I would never use was sat and would automatically correct a pupil who had done so.

I am willing to believe it was once correct, but was certainly not regarded as right in my schooldays.

I wish newsreaders were taught not to say A, pronounced A, as in the names of the first letter of the alphabet, before a noun,
eg A decision, rather than a as in euh. Agreed?
THE is normally pronounced THEE when the noun begins with a vowel, isn’t it?

All of the above plus George Clarke, architect who, and I know he has a Sunderland accent, says Are-i-tet. I just wish he’d manage to get the hard C sound in somewhere!

”I was sitting/I was sat.” Both are correct but mean different things. As NotSpaghetti said: ”I was taught years ago (and am prepared to be wrong) that sat would generally be done to you. “She sat him in the corner”.

You are not wrong, NotSpaghetti, it's the passive voice. The same with ”I was standing/I was stood”. However, I don't think people who say ”I was sat/stood” mean that somebody put them there. So to use it in that sense is wrong. We wouldn't say ”I was drunk” when we mean I was drinking”.

What seems to be happening is that somebody starts saying something and it spreads like wildfire.

What has irritated me for some time now is the use of ”also – as well”. I hear this every day, e.g. ”We can do A but we can also do B as well.” Presenters do it, politicians do it but I wish they wouldn't!

I'm hearing more people say Aks [Arcs] instead of Ask - what's that all about??