Quote Originally Posted by NYCBlue View Post
I met an English girl last week at work and she said "torch" in a conversation with an American. I asked her how long she'd been here and she said ten years. I told her I was surprised she said torch and then I asked her how she pronounced "schedule". I use American words and spellings all the time when talking with Americans. I can't be arsed with all the questions about my accent. Some people seem to like to use it to draw attention to themselves though.
I don't at all mind people asking about my accent. They're just being curious. Sometimes, though, if there's time, I ask them to guess. That's always amusing. England, Scotland, Ireland, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, around the world they go. Wales really is the invisible country. Fair play, though, a barber once asked me about it while I was sitting in his chair. Plenty of time, so I made him guess. He took a step back, comb and scissors frozen in the air, pondered a moment and then said, "You're from that place Tom Jones is from."

I don't do the "British thing" either (It's a flashlight). I've been here so long I forget there's anything distinctive about my speech until someone asks about it. Time was, in written communications on British boards like this one, I would try to conform to British spelling instead of the American spellings I have used every day for decades. It's exhausting. So it is what it is, I am what I am. Please forgive the "z's" and the double apostrophes.