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Full Version: Telepathy with a Cat! (lol)
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Today, in passing, I saw a cat whom I often see, only that cat usually ignores me, no matter what I say. I had no idea what his (her?) name was.

Today I suddenly heard the name "Ben" when I caught his gaze. So I called "Ben!" to him, and lo and behold, the cat came running to greet me! So we kind of made neighbourly contact.

Later I saw his human (man), and I asked what his cat was called. He replied "Burton Ernie Bassett"....so I thought I couldn't have been farther off the mark with my "Ben" idea.

But then I asked him to say it again, and when he said "Burton" he dropped the "T" and said it quickly, like "B-e-'n". The way he said it sounded a lot like "Ben"..... LOL! That cat is convinced his name is Ben. He doesn't seem to care about the Ernie Bassett bit (that's only for form-filling at the vet's!) Smiley4 

Not bad telepathy, eh Tobi? Smiley16
Tobi, in the west country words are often "softened" and/or abbreviated in pronounciation - as you no doubt know. One famous example is the town Cirencester in Gloucestershire, which used to be pronounced by locals as "Sis-it-er" in the earlier twentieth century but is these days usually pronounced more or less as it is spelt (my mother lived there as a girl). In the same way, Gloucester is usually pronounced "Glostu" (with the u like in "up").

The elision of the letter T in Burton sounds very Somerset ("Zummerzet") to me; you would know about that, though, better than I do! I did a study of Dorset (Darzet) dialect and pronunciation many years ago and it has similar features.

So Bu(rt)on sounding like Ben, sounds very likely to me!
The cat not knowing all the fascinating word explanations actually hears the name Ben. So it looks like he did tell you his name as he hears it.  I have often wondered about cats and telepathy.

The English language is very strange. It is my native language and I have studied it and there are still words I have no idea how to pronounce. I wonder if we will ever just start spelling things how they sound or will we start pronouncing things the way they are written.

Maybe the cat wasn't willing to talk to you until you called him by name. He must have wanted you to know his name. Nothing about cats surprizes me. You are able to hear your crow, so why not a cat.
Yes the English language is strange. It must be really difficult for a stranger to it, to learn!
I mean....who would imagine a word like Gloucester should be pronounced "Gloster"...or even in another way as LPC said!

And then there are the different accents and different dialects. Phew! Too much for your average cat to take on board. Smiley4

Meow is the same in any language.
Cows in the UK allegedly say "Moo" - and when I lived there, it certainly sounded like that. But here in France, the cows allegedly say "Meuh" (pronounced rather than "purr" or "sir" but with the r not sounded at the end). Having listened to cows here in France over many years, I think that is about right, too. Different dialects?!
I secretly think our English cows are not fans of Brexit! For the simple reason that they all say "Meuh" too. I never heard an English cow say "Moo."
I have never heard a cow say moo. I think what I have heard is more like "MMMMouuuuw" or "MMMMoauuuw"

I understand that ducks have different accents or do we hear them differently.


[Image: 69d1d7cffb1eeab05a76b8d7f736f711--duck-s...hapman.jpg]
Even more detailed.
[Image: duck.jpg]


Do chickens really go "cluck".
Dogs make all kinds of sounds.
I have heard bark, woof, yap, ruff and sounds that I don't know how to spell.
The Ducks!..... 79   Absolutely hilarious Catherine! I nearly split my sides.
It is pretty funny. Either ducks have accents or we hear with an accent. Either way it is funny that we try to make human sounds out of animal voices.
That is awesome. When I see cats or dogs I will say random names and sound to try and guess the name of an animal. We sound like the Peanuts adults to dogs so sounds are usually a good way to get near a name. I've been known to go though the alphabet with my own dogs when they were "found". It's fun to try and guess the name.

This is why I like Spanish. Everything is spelled the way you say it. I'm an awesome speller in Spanish, English not so much. I always double and triple check my spelling and sometimes. Yo tengo un mono. Translates to I have a monkey in english but you would say it exactly the way it looks. You pronounce all of the letters. So once you know how the alphabet is pronounced you can spell or pronounce any word. They don't have multiple ways to pronounce every letter like we do in English. ll is it's own letter and pronounced like a y! I need to get back into learning spanish on Duolengo again.
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