In a manner of speaking…

Several of Earth Science's finest young minds (and in at least one case, bodies) have put it to me this week that I have an accent; I disagree. Whatever crude regionality my voice may have tried to adopt under the pernicious influence of a London lying so close by was beaten out of me by my mother and great aunt as a young 'un. In the final analysis, I speak with the moderated tones of received pronunciation, as practised by BBC announcers and the less retarded members of the Royal Family (Windsor, of course, being about six miles down the road from my hometown). This is English as it is meant to be spoken. Therefore I don't have an accent. It's everyone else that does.