~ ANNE! ~

It's been a difficult day. It started rather abruptly with Brandon knocking on my door going, "Aren't you going to work today?" Turned out I had 20 min to be out the door. Good thing Brandon checked, or I probably would have got to work at noon (like Paul did today, who also slept in!) The day's been devoted to being told that I have a "funny accent". TWO people used those exact words over the phone, and one lady said, "Wow, you have a strange accent - a combination of American and Scottish. Especially when you say the word 'night'." !!!... Not sure what to say to that one. I'm starting to get a bit of a complex about my accent, especially after the one lady who screamed, "OH MY GAWD!!!" in a fake American accent when I told her how many pitches we had available at one of our campsites. Not funny, lady.

The other thing is that no one can ever understand when I say the word "three". They always think I'm saying "two", and I don't know why. Makes it very hard when you're giving people reference numbers and things all the time over the phone. So odd, too - I swear I say them fairly clearly, but every single day someone mistakes three for two. Bah.

At least I'm doing better than Jane, the Kiwi who sits next to me, though. She spends all day saying, "Would you like a pit-frindly or pit-free cabin? PIT-FRIENDLY or PIT-FREE?? You know, pits, like a cat or dog?" People have trouble with me but they have an impossible time with Kiwi vowels, apparently. And they keep asking her if she's from Australia or America, which has to be annoying.

It's weird, though, because when I was home I realised that I have a pretty mild accent (albiet VERY small-town Albertan). Compared to a lot of people in Rocky (my brother Tim, for example) I should be very easy for British people to understand. Apparently not today, though. sigh. I've been trying to quantify what makes people from mid-Alberta sound different. For one thing, we don't say "or", we change it to "er". "We should head to Calgry er Emminton", for example. And we somehow speak with what I would describe as an oilfield drawl. You don't open your mouth all the way and you're not always too particular about grammar. It's weird going home and thinking everyone sounds funny, I must say.

Speaking of work, my new motto is, "If you don't have a brain, you shouldn't be allowed near a phone".

So it's been rainy and muggy for a few days now, and the snails are out in force. The snails here are enormous. They'd be at least a mouthful or two at least, I reckon, if you were into escargot. I find them quite fascinating - these huge snails crawling all over the walks. If you prod them they go into their shells, and then just their eyes on little feelers poke out to see if you've gone away. Very cool animals (in a slimy gross kind of way).

I'm thinking of making cookies in honour of Canada Day tomorrow (because I can't be bothered with Nanaimo bars this year). Chocolate chips are like gold dust here, though. Impossible to find and super expensive when you do find them. Apparently I should have added chocolate chips to the giant haul of Kraft Dinner, peanut butter and licorice I hauled back with me from Canada. Ah well, I will probably do it anyway. A taste of home! (Unlike escargot...)

Speaking of French cuisine, I love Camembert. Thought I'd just throw that in, as it's one of the things I missed about here when I was home. You can get a tiny little wheel of it in some supermarkets for a lot of money, but not six different kinds like you can here. Something to whine about missing once I'm on the other side of the pond, I guess.