Speech Impediment

[2008]

[This is a funny article. Aajonus thought he meant a speech diction, but Fred meant drug addiction]

[Fred

What's like what causes addiction?

[Aajonus]

Watch your language.

[Attendees]

*Laughs*

[Fred]

And what would you do diet wise? Would you do anything special for an addict other than the raw diet?

[Aajonus]

You mean like Tourettes syndrome, you have that problem? You asshole.

[Attendees]

*Laughs*

[Aajonus]

Diction. I had a Tennessee accent, plus when they gave me braces, my teeth were all crooked and everything and buked, and they gave me braces at 15 years old and took out 4 major teeth. They shrunk my mouth up, my tongue was too big, so I've got a big fat tongue and it restricted my tongue movement, so I lisped after I got my braces off, even while I had my braces on I lisped, but they said once the brace came off, I wouldn't list anymore. So, I lisped. So, this is just part of that story.

And so you got a membrane here and you see I don't have one cuz after five years of lisping, I took a scissors and I clipped that tongue and it bled for a little while, but my tongue was able to move properly again, I lost the lisp.

[Attendees]

*Shocked*

[Aajonus]

But anyway, I still had a Southern accent cuz I spent from 3 - 7 years old in Oak Ridge, Tennessee and my mother's family, all 13 of those children with 200 offspring all were from Alabama. So big, heavy accent.

So, I was very sick in Los Angeles. Couldn't work as a computer analyst anymore, a program analyst anymore, so I started working as an actor by a fluke and they said that I would have to lose my accent, back then they were more prejudiced, 1969 when I started. So, I got a diction teacher. I don't know if some of you may know her Lurene Tuttle.

She was a nurse on Julia and she was an old radio star, but she was like my second grandmother, very dear person. She gave me one exercise and got rid of it in 10 days, my accent, my diction. She says, 'All you have to do is say 5 minutes at a time, 4 to 5 times a day, P P P T T T K K K, in that order. You say each one 3 or 4 times, and you keep saying that for a full five minutes and your accents will be gone and sure enough.

[Attendee]

Any accent?

[Aajonus]

Any accent, any accent.

[Attendee]

Which order?

[Aajonus]

P, T, K. You have to repeat each one, many times over a 5 minute period with 3 P P P T T T K K K.

If you wanna say P P P P T T T T K K k k, you can do that too. 3 to 4 repetitions at a time, as many within that five minutes. So, that takes care of your diction.

[Fred]

Pardon my addiction, but the question was what causes addiction?

[Aajonus]

Oh, addiction!

[Attendees]

*Laughs intensely*