> Oh, but I do wonder about the food tasting experiences I'll never be able to have because my tongue doesn't work like others. It's a similar sort of thing to hearing accents in speech. I perceive British, Southern, Australian, etc accents by the differences with my own. I hear no accent in my own speech. But if I go to New Zealand or England or Texas, they all hear an accent in me and not in themselves. I would *love* to be able to hear my own accent as *they* do, because surely it must sound cool and unusual as I find theirs. Moreover, a New Zealander and a Texan would perceive each other's accent, but they must perceive it in an *entirely* different way than *I* do. I would *love* to hear what a Texas accent sounds like from a New Zealand accent frame of reference, or vice versa, but there again, that's an experience I'll never have, because I must escape myself to experience it.

This reminded me of something very cool that happened to me when ahmoacah was here. We were talking about accents, and although I did not think she had any kind of an accent, she said that I had a trace of the cliche "aboot" thing going on. She said it wasn't as defined as "aboot", but rather, a rounding out of my o's on some words. When she told me this, I tried saying some of the words out loud, but the accent didn't come out... I then proceeded to use "our" in a sentence naturally, and it was there, and she pointed it out to me immediately, and I HEARD IT. It is one of the most surreal experiences I have ever had -- hearing my own accent as though I didn't have it myself. I never would have thought it was possible before this... I suspect the reason I could do it is because Canada is bombarded with so many different manners of speech through Canadian and American and British media, plus a melting pot of different people groups. Being exposed to so many other ways of speaking may help to make me used to them and think of them as natural, and thus be able to hear my own voice as unnatural when the right things are pointed out to me.

Anyway, it was really cool.

Don "Thanks ahmoacah!" Monkey