My wife pronounces "where" and "wear" exactly alike and thinks my
pronunciation of "where" is sufficiently alien to her to be no end of
amusement. She pronounces "why" like the letter "Y". It leaves me
wondering why she doesn't pronounce "who" as "woo". When I point that
out, she becomes puzzled. She never thought about that until I
pointed it out, then she just declares "That's just how it is," and
avoids thinking about it further, since she prefers to think that her
pronunciation is generally better than mine, when there is a
difference.