Subj : National Anthem To : MIKE POWELL From : Rob Mccart Date : Wed Jan 22 2025 01:13:00 RM>> Re: the 'Accent'.. When most Americans think of a Canadian accent they >> think of what is mostly a Northern or Eastern accent actually used by >> very few of us. You expect us to say 'aboot' instead of about. For the >> most part the bulk of us have no true accent, we just say words exactly >> as they are spelled but, like in the USA, there are areas that do have >> a distinctly different accent and often use different words for things. MP>When I was in Canada, I noticed that most of the Canadians I ran into had >no accent. They were sometimes difficult to understand, though, because by >no accent I mean they also didn't accent any of their syllables. If they >spoke fast, it was difficult to catch some words. I was about to say you must have hit an area that speaks a little differently but then I thought, one thing I notice about a lot of American accents is that they draw out vowels so maybe you were hearing our usual 'accent' and to us (like for most people) we feel WE Don't have an accent.. B) MP>This would have been in Ontario, mostly north of Lakes Superior and Huron. That covers a lot of area. I grew up in Southern Ontario never more than a few miles from the Great Lakes. The last 39 years I've been on the shores of Georgian Bay, which is on Lake Huron. We are considered Central Ontario although treated like Northern Ontario by most government plans that change with where you live since anyone much more than 150 miles North of Toronto have the same basic living problems, a long distance between places and much colder temperatures in Winter, so we tend to get small rebates on energy used to heat the house and such. MP>The few people I ran into that had accents either sounded like a Red Green >character, sounded slighly British, or sounded slightly French. That was >very few people. Yes, a lot of Northern areas are like that, and probably similar things in Alberta, which is sort of the 'Texas' of Canada.. (Not the French part) This year for the first time in many years I am staying through the winter in my cabin on the bay. For many years because they needed my help in winter I stayed with my parents in Parry Sound over the winter but they have both passed now and I had to decide what to do. I spent winters here for 13 years quite a while back so I had a rough idea of what to expect but it's a bit more of a challenge now that I'm older. This place has poor insulation and, for now, I can't use anything but the inadequate electric heat (60 AMP service) after the insurance company banned my use of the old wood stove I put in 40 years ago. Last night the temperature dropped down to at least -25c (-13f) and pails of water I had on the floor in the kitchen froze quite a bit. It was down near 40f when I woke up. I turn off the bigger heater and use just a single 2000 watt baseboard heater at night. It's actually left set to about 68f but it can't manage on its own when it drops much below freezing. On several cold nights I've woken up to it being near 40f in here, and most mornings it starts off closer to 50f than 60f. There's no practical way to keep running water going so I have a 'box' about 200 feet out on the ice covering a hole I break through each day to get pails of water and I have an out house (privy?) for a toilet so I am 'roughing' it a little bit here.. BTW, this is not a money thing. I could easily afford to rent a house or apartment for winter or even year round but I would go stir crazy I think living in town all the time. Here, I spend so much time and energy just staying alive that I don't have much time to get bored.. B) Oh, and I sort of read with amusement what some people there say when you get a little snow. 3 or 4 times this year withing a day or two I have gotten 20 to 30 inches of snow at a time, which can make trudging out to get water even more fun.. 6 to 8 inches of snow is nothing.. B) --- * SLMR Rob * Celibacy is NOT hereditory * Origin: capitolcityonline.net * Telnet/SSH:2022/HTTP (1:2320/105) .