>>>How about much, such, clutch, fun, smut, but, butter, dull, full, gull, gum, gun, hun, nun, pun, ....?
>>>All pronounced as in butcher.
>>
>>Huh? I hear all these as short "ah", not as short "oo".
>
>All the same as butcher, however you hear that. Where I come from, soft "u" is pronounced as "oo" as in "wood".

I'll have to hear you some day... there's no way sounds can be properly represented in English. It begins to look like the Chinese ideograms - everyone writes them the same, and pronounces it in a local manner.

>>There's a story about two Belgrade reporters from London, 80 years ago, who got into a dispute about pronunciation of "such". A said "sač", and B said "soč". They wrote the word on a piece of paper and asked the first gentleman they met to read it. When they heard him, they turned to each other at said at the same time: "You see?"
>
>Deja vu again!

Same here - I knew I wrote this before, but couldn't remember where. And then I'd have to add (again :) my daughter's invention: deja vu amnesia: I have a feeling I've forgotten this before.