Quote - I always attributed all of our funny pronunciations, such as Thames, to the Norman conquest and the French. However, like many English girls, I have a shocking weakness for French accents, and am powerless before those who wield one.

My actual surname is a case in point of that... it's an anglicised form of a fairly uncommon Norman name... although there is a town near Warrington that bears my surname.

Although I was born in Scotland... I have to come clean, I do have at least a quarter or so of English blood in my veins

...and quite a lot of the rest is probably a mixture of Irish and Dutch for that matter... as it turns out.