newshound wrote
The Natural Philosopher wrote

(I remember my Norfolk grandfather refused to accept the French invaders
pronunciation. The car lived in the 'garridge', not a poncey 'garage')...

That's an interesting one. My recollection from my upbringing in South
London was of 50-50 useage, perhaps a slight working class / middle class
split?

Bet it wasnt actually slight at all.

I don't think I am consistent in Gloucestershire now but it seems to me
that both are equally acceptable. Here is another viewpoint off the web; I
think the phonetics essentially represents your two versions.

"When I grew up in North London, We said /ˈɡærɑːʒ/, and looked down on the
lower-class people around us who said /ˈɡærɪdʒ/. But when I moved to
Yorkshire, and gradually started talking Yorkshire (sometimes - depends
who I'm talking to), I found that /ˈɡærɑːʒ/ seemed alien to it, and
adopted /ˈɡærɪdʒ/.

There are no middle class there, they are all plebs.

Now when I'm in the South and not talking Yorkshire, I don't know which to
use: I think I say /ˈɡærɪdʒ/ more often."