Regional Dialects/Odd Sayings

[veejer]

Originally Posted by Broadway

Heh.

ON the floor
ce-MENT
peh-CAHN
SI-ren

I've got one for you guys (if you can even decipher what I'm asking for )

Pretend you're at an intersection. What do you call the relationship between positions A and D?

A l B
C l D

I call these kittycorner from each other.

I can ditto Broadway's responses, but then I was born in MI and live in NW OH, about 20 minutes from the border.

"Have a good one" is common here and my daughter loves her "hoodies".

[Google]

 

[Texicana]

I've been known to use "have a good one" myself. My brother and I have our own particular phrase for having something to eat, "throw a munch"

[keemameelia]

In MA, I was confused by these:

"packy" is a liquor store
"bubbler" is a water fountain
Worcester is pronounced WOO-ster
Concord is pronounced CAHN-kid

I always say "fixin' to" which confused my husband.

[keemameelia]

Oh, and I call everything Coke. Here they always say "Is Pepsi alright?" But Coke is everything from Dr. Pepper to Pepsi to Coke.

[keemameelia]

Oh, and I say "catty corner"

[Unklescott]

Originally Posted by FinallyHere

Diagonal to each other

There's one in every crowd.

[phat32]

Originally Posted by Stargazer

Ok, if its me, Unk, and Lucy, I'm thinking now that its an Appalachian thing. So, not even common enough to be called Southern. Well, I'm saying it anyway. :phhht

I think I can shed some more light on "on the floor"/"in the floor". I'm originally from California, and I would say "on the floor"--always "on the floor." My girlfriend is from the Deep South, and when I finished reading this segment, I looked up and said, "Quick, you walk into a room and all the chairs are taken. Do you sit ON the floor, or IN the floor?"

Her: "On the floor. But I've heard the phrase 'in the floor.'"

So there you have it, for what it's worth.

[Stargazer]

Thanks Phat. I should have known you'd shed some light on this. Lucy and I *aren't* the only two.

[Unklescott]

On many of these I have to think pre or post move above the Mason Dixon line.

[phat32]

Originally Posted by Mr_PeaCH

Here's one that I believe is unique to (or at least, originated in) "So Cal"... err, southern California.

When you talk about driving on the freeway you refer to it with great familiarity... it's "5" or "the 5". Never "I-5" or "Interstate 5" or "the 5 freeway".

Also, around San Diego at least, tourists are generally referred to as "Zonies"... whether or not they actually drove out from Arizona.

I, too, use "280" or "the 280". My girlfriend (a Southerner) thinks it's extremely strange. She'll often tease me, "Okay, take this exit on 119...or in your language, THEEE 119." It's gotten to the point that if she gives me directions and says something like "...and take Interstate-65," I'll ask her, "Where's that?"

At Thanksgiving, she, my brother, my parents and I all got together for the holidays. We actually got hot and heavy into this one. Strangely, my parents sided with her, but my brother and I held firm to "the 65." We think maybe it's because my brother and I spent a lot of time in SoCal while my parents are NoCal all the way.

And, by the way, I went to school in San Diego. I never heard "Zonies," but we had a word for out-of-towners: nuisance. I don't remember San Diego being particularly friendly to outsiders (or to its own residents, for that matter).