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At the age of 52 I have learned...

69 replies

lovelyweathertoday · 16/02/2022 01:11

... that porpoises are very similar to dolphins.

For some reason I thought they were like porcupines. How was I so wrong for so long?!

OP posts:
Thoosa · 16/02/2022 01:12
Grin

I had something similar at Christmas. Forget what now.

DropYourSword · 16/02/2022 01:12

It was just over 2 years ago I discovered I had been pronouncing Tortoise and Porpoise completely incorrectly for 3 decades Blush

lovelyweathertoday · 16/02/2022 01:17

Did you make the oi sound? I do that too and my partner thinks I'm strange.

OP posts:
DropYourSword · 16/02/2022 01:26

Yes! I'm from far north - maybe it's a northern thing?

lovelyweathertoday · 16/02/2022 01:27

Originally from the south east here ! Grin

OP posts:
DropYourSword · 16/02/2022 01:29

Scuppers that theory!!

BessieFinknottle · 16/02/2022 01:55

Oh dear, is the oi sound wrong then?Blush

SirenSays · 16/02/2022 02:00

No one seems to know for sure what the correct pronunciation is. I avoid the whole debate and just say turtle 🐢

MrsEricBana · 16/02/2022 02:03

I think should be tortuss and porpuss but maybe there are regional differences

user6573 · 16/02/2022 02:56

Age 35 I discovered that some people pronounce tortoise and porpoise without an oi sound and that makes me uncomfortable.

SweetPotatoDumpling · 16/02/2022 10:18

What?? They don't have an /oi/ sound? What sound do they have then, I'm intrigued? In my classroom they do GrinBlush I even have pictures on my Letters and Sounds Phonics Display of a tortoise in my /oi/ 'window' (commercially produced I hasten to add, so clearly lots of people seem to think the same as me!)

Bigfathairyones · 16/02/2022 10:19

Laughing a lot at Thoosa's comment...this is my life right now (52)

AdditionalCharacter · 16/02/2022 10:28

Turtlesq and tortoises are two different animals though @SirenSays. One swims, the other doesn't.

merryhouse · 16/02/2022 10:38

If you think of Alice in Wonderland there's that whole thing of taking a porpoise when you go on a journey because

if you tell someone you're going on a journey they will ask "with what porpoise?"

though I've always pronounced the oi Grin

It was a while (I mean, literally years) before I realised "one and done" was intended to rhyme.

Sausagedogsarethebest · 16/02/2022 10:44

And did you know that, if it gets damaged, a tortoise's shell will bleed. Found this out when I had two males who would fight and bash each others shells. The outer shell also has nerve endings, so any injuries could be painful.

This is my boy if anyone's interested. He's the one that got bullied.

At the age of 52 I have learned...
DropYourSword · 16/02/2022 10:46

It was a while (I mean, literally years) before I realised "one and done" was intended to rhyme.

Wait...what??!

Are they?
Won and done rhyme to me.

One rhymes with scone (which opens another can of worms!).

youngestisapsycho · 16/02/2022 11:12

Won and one are the same sound...

DropYourSword · 16/02/2022 11:15

@youngestisapsycho

Won and one are the same sound...
Not to me! Won - sounds like wun One - sounds like w-on (it's difficult to write how you pronounce something- but like pronouncing the w of 'wait' and then adding on to it
Somethingsnappy · 16/02/2022 11:21

Just here for the pronunciation debate! One and done don't rhyme when I say it! One rhymes with con.

Somethingsnappy · 16/02/2022 11:22

I'm with you, @DropYourSword!

Zilla1 · 16/02/2022 11:25

@Sausagedogsarethebest how old is he and which species (Hermann's?) Did you have them both from eggs and, if so, when did you realise they were both males?

Twospaniels · 16/02/2022 11:52

It must depend where you come from then

To me, one and won are the same and both rhyme with done.

My dad does speech therapy following a small stroke. One of the t gue twisters is

One-one was a racehorse
Two-two was one too
When one-one won one race
Two-two won one too

The whole point is that one and won are the same, as are two and too of course.

Twospaniels · 16/02/2022 11:53

Tongue twisters!

mawbroon · 16/02/2022 12:02

Wait til you hear about Orcas...

🤣🤣

amusedbush · 16/02/2022 12:14

I say tor-toise (Scottish) and I saw a TikTok on this subject. It seems like more people in the south of England say tor-tiss while the other pronunciation is more northern. Although tor-tiss sounds less odd to my ear than people who pronounce forehead like "forrid" Grin

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