Funny phrases? Regional, Familial or invented

14 years ago

Maybe it is because I'm worried about loosing my mom soon or maybe it is just me getting old but I've been thinking a lot about when I was a kid. We never had a sofa or a couch; we always had a davenport. To this day my mom sleeps on a pellow not a pIllow, I think she looks in the murra to check her lipstick. We called the fidge the icebox. And my mom still says, "Put it on the zinc" meaning put it on the counter next to the sink. My grandma said this too. I thought it was because my Irish grandmother was brought up in a German household. But then I thought maybe the drainboards were made of zinc back in the day? I know DH and I picked up a habit (I think in CA) that drives our Seattle friends crazy. It seems normal to say THE 305 when talking about a highway where the locals just say, "take 305." I know I've seen some very fun phrases in threads- especially from the south. I'd love for you to share your fun words.

Sort by:Oldest

Comments (90)

Mimou-GW
Original Author
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
To quote Charlie Brown, "AAUGH" I was having so much fun catching up on this thread until I was brought to a screeching halt by the tutorial. Geez louise, now I've got a bee in my bonnet. Let me assure you that I am aware of the difference between lose and loose. I apologize for my poor edit. Loosen up, hon.

Teacats- DH's family are all from Scotland and I really relate to your post! I'll never forget the first time I met them. It was very educational for this Irish, Catholic girl. Apparently the tail piece of the roasted chicken is called the pope's nose and those of the Catholic faith were known as Mackerel-snappers- a reference to the old custom of eating fish on Fridays. Not the kind of welcome I was looking for.
rockmanor
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Housewitch, as a fellow southerner, I appreciate your explanation of y'all. After 30+ years in the south, even my midwestern hubby gets it (finally!)

I haven't seen any "Yat" expressions so far. Yats are native New Orleanians, although some apply the term strictly to those who live in the 'burbs (that is, the outlying parishes - what other states call counties.) The first time a friend excused herself from a group by saying, "I have to carry Mama to Schwegmann's to make groceries", I needed a translation. I was also a little slow on the uptake when someone yelled at me that I'd dropped one of my packages on the neutral ground and another on the banquette (the grassy median where the streetcar runs and the sidewalk.) It didn't help that these supposed southerners were speaking with what sounded to me like Brooklyn accents mixed with a little mangled french. There's a wonderful little book, part cookbook and part family stories, entitled, "Who's Your Mama, Are You Catholic, and Can You Make a Roux?" I think it sums up what's important to a lot of folks in Louisiana. :-)

One of my mother's often used expressions was, "He doesn't have the sense God gave a billygoat." The first time I heard myself say that, I just about died of embarrassment.
My parents were very strict about anything remotely like swearing, with one exception. I knew mother was really angry when she came out with "Hell's Bells!"

Growing up in "mission country" with nearly all FBI (foreign born Irish) priests, I sometimes heard an exasperated "Holy Mother of God!" That's when I knew to make myself scarce.

As for some of the words mentioned previously, I never heard of sandals being called thongs until I was over 30. We called them zories (sp?), a reference to a Japanese term for flat sandals. If we were offered dessert after a large meal, we'd say we had room for a scoshi (very small) bit.

I picked up "soda" from dh, and had to learn to specify what kind of "Coke" I want (diet, please) when ordering in a restaurant after we moved to the deep south. As mentioned earlier, barbeque is pork, slow cooked (and preferably pulled apart and coated with a sweet tomato-based sauce once it's done.) A pig-pickin' is a fine way to pass an evening. That's when a whole pig is slow roasted outside until it about falls apart. It's generally accompanied by lots of sweet tea (pronounced like sweetea - one word), beer (unless the hosts are "Babtist"), Silver Queen corn, cornbread, and amazing cakes like seven layer caramel or hummingbird cake.
At least one person will say, "I liked to died and gone to heaven, that was so good!" ;-)
Related Discussions
So you want to grow a gardenia, huh?
Q
Comments (6)
· Posted by: hnwillis z8 SC (My Page) on Thu, Nov 29, 01 at 15:22 Ya'll gotta be some of the funniest people. After going through the ordeal of many a gardenia suicides, I decided it was time to plant them outside (great humidity and heat-Z8 SC). I hate to say this but two years ago I planted 2 gardenia plants on the northwest side of my house. They have been doing just fine. They are just at 2-3 feet tall. I have pruned them together this past sprng into a low hedge next to my white picket fence. I have planted the trimmings amongst a groundcover of Gerbera Daisies in a 24 inch plastic pot that I also planted a 10 ft crooked willow tree on the southside of my house. I also put some trimmings into small pots with cheap Wal-Mart garden soil. To my surprise, they have taken root and are growing like crazy. I put one particular cutting into a pot by itself to be able to bring in the house. I left it outside all spring and summer (it rained constantly when I first planted them). This one stayed in 5 inches of water/dirt for 2 months. I have brought the sole potted plant into my sunroom and placed it inside a miniture greenhouse. I doesn't seem to be growing like it did outside. I'm really thinking that it likes to be outdoors in humidity, heat and southern exposure. Go figure? So from 1 pruning of two plants I have successfully propagated 10+ little ones. I can't wait until they bloom. Also, the main idea for planting them outside is that my neighbor has a 10 ft tall, 7 ft wide "gardenia bush" that is heavenly when it blooms. I have taken pictures of it because people don't believe me. I know she doesn't do anything special to any of her plants. One thing we do have in common is acidic clay soil which our azaleas and camellias seem to thrive on. · Posted by: bedou z10 Ft. L. Fl (My Page) on Fri, Dec 7, 01 at 1:15 Its 1:09 in the morning. My laughter must have woken my husband up, so I suppose I should put the kettle on! From a nude plot of land in Ft. Lauderdale, I have tried to fill it up with fragrant choices. Yes, Gardenia included. Its yellow leaves tend to give me a good contrast against all those green ones that are flourishing. Alas, they tend to fall off, so I just use them as mulch where they land. Time to find something else! I certainly shall not spend time agonizing over it, from what you have all said. Oh well, I had such high hopes!!! Joanmary · Posted by: fpogoda 5 N NJ (My Page) on Mon, Dec 17, 01 at 12:21 Just wanted to be sure regarding the indoor gardenia temp. issue: is the optimum temperature 70 degrees during the day, then 55 degrees at night? Thanks · Posted by: yugoslava 6 ) on Sat, Dec 29, 01 at 20:56 I have been fairly successful with azaleas and rhododendrons and wonder if it would be possible to keep gardenia dormant over winter and bring it out in spring, plant it among rhodos and leave it until it gets cold. I have admired gardenias from afar for the longest time, but I knew indoor conditions in the winter were not the best, so I have never had one to call my own. Would it be possible to keep gardenia cool over winter as I do with my fig tree and brugmansia? The scent is absolutely intoxicating! One word about people who live in warm or coastal areas. You have no trouble growing tropical plants which we can only see when we take tropical vacations for which we have to pay dearly. I live in Great Lakes Region with short seasons but we all dream of exotic plants growing luxuriantly indoors. Which is why we fret and fuss endlessly. · Posted by: Jenn z9/19 SoCal (My Page) on Tue, Jan 8, 02 at 10:16 This has to be the funniest thread I've ever read at the GardenWeb. I laughed so hard I could hardly talk and had tears in my eyes!! I printed out the whole thread to share with other pour souls who have tried to grow Gardenias according to all the best recommendations, only to watch them wither away. We have a Gardenia growing on a slight slope in alkaline clay soil under a Japanese Black Pine tree. It gets mid-to-late sun. It gets watered whenever we run the lawn sprinklers. It isn't the most prolific plant we grow, but at least it's alive and produces some blooms for us each year. The success is probably due to the fact that my husband is the one who cares for it, and he is not a by-the-book gardener... he just waters whenever he thinks the lawn needs water, feeds it when he remembers (I think the last time was about 2 years ago), etc. LOL!!! · Posted by: Rosalie 5-6 salt lake (My Page) on Wed, Jan 9, 02 at 11:30 this thread is hilarious! and now famous -- a link to it is posted at the garden party forum, so some of us have wandered over to check out your battles -- i believe i will stick with xeric types -- no chicken dances for me -- thanks for the laughs! and good luck to all -- rosalie · Posted by: ccl38 8A Savannah, GA (My Page) on Thu, Jan 17, 02 at 15:59 I too have had trouble with vetchii. Mine was so large and so heavy with blooms I decided to prune it. We couldn't get past it down the walk. Once prunned it went into a decline and it has never been the same. I have another variety that I rooted about three years ago from a large bush growing at the edge of the swamp near where I work. It is mostly in shade, never gets watered and would probably measure 5 feet, and it has those huge saucer size blossoms and smells wonderful. I don't shake a chicken so I guess I must have held my mouth right when I planted it. They are my favorite plant. For me it is a pass along plant. I root them all summer and give them to anyone who comes along and wants one. · Posted by: Joanmary_z10 z10 Ft. L. Fl. (My Page) on Thu, Jan 17, 02 at 19:23 cc 138 you must have 'the magic touch'Well done, and I say that with honest envy. The question is, are you ready, willing and able to produce 75-+ rooted cuttings from a 'proven' specimen with the right karma, one for each of the above postings, to restore our faith in this plant and to bring aid and comfort to all of us who have been brought down by this picky, picky plant? lol!!! Joanmary · Posted by: Lily 5 IL (My Page) on Fri, Jan 18, 02 at 21:16 I got a Gardenia "Veitchii" last January as a gift, loaded with buds. Looking for culture info I found this thread. Aftering reading everyone's experience, I thought I was going to kill it for sure. I held my breath when I was anywhere near it. I misted it daily and then decided not to mist after my hard water left ugly mineral stains on the leaves. More then half of the buds dropped and it refused to bloom indoor! It got a lot of half yellowed leaves before I dragged it outside in late Spring. It thrived outside and bloomed! In the mean time I got hooked on orchids. I started using the leftover orchid water (rain water with 1/4 strenth of fertilizer and a drop of Superthrive/per gallon) to water the gardenia. It's been growing like crazy! Now it's back in the house in front of my south facing window, and in bloom! It's in a 12" plastic pot and about 2 feet tall. Maybe it's the rain water or the superthrive, but there is definitely hope for all gardenia lovers! · Posted by: Jenn z9/19 SoCal (My Page) on Sun, Jan 20, 02 at 13:40 So that's the trick... "water with leftover orchid water". Why don't the gardening books say that?!? LOL! · Posted by: Lali z9, 18, So Cal (My Page) on Mon, Jan 21, 02 at 15:16 I can't believe how long this topic has gone on for. It is sooo hilarious! Anyway, I'm trying my first attempt to grow gardenias. I put them in the backyard (northern exposure) with ferns and azaleas, so I'm hoping they will be ok. Now that I've read this post, I'm really really really skeptical that they will bloom or even live by my hand. Thanks for the laugh! Lali · Posted by: freesias Z9 ) on Tue, Feb 19, 02 at 23:35 Oh My GOD! I just planted THREE 1 gal. 'Veitchii' gardenias in my front yard mixed border. I have a feeling, my are gonna DIE on me. I am definitely not touching these guys! Will water once every couple of weeks. THAT'S IT!!!! · Posted by: susan_CA z9 CA ) on Sun, Feb 24, 02 at 16:05 What a great thread! Gardenia culture is such a thrill of success/agony of defeat experience. Anticipating an unknown failure rate, I bought 6 'Veitchii'! The two planted directly under a tree (where I wanted to sit) and northern foundation exposure died. The two planted in eastern foundation exposure with shade mid-day on bloom copiously all summer. The two planted in western foundation exposure, where light tree shade relieves afternoon heat after 4pm do almost as well. All get composted manure in early spring, pine needle mulch, half-strength chelated minerals whenever leaves begin to pale or MirAcid if I think of it, water from sprinkler system early a.m. (including on leaves) daily in summer in the hot, dry central valley, and have FAST drainage. The two that died were in locations with slower drainage and more shade. The only year I had some bud drop was the year we had a late, wet spring, but they bloomed fine all summer. I have seen specimens in full sun in the central valley; they bloom well, but leaves & blossoms show sunburn damage. So I'm going with the sun/shade, wet/dry, feed/not theory. · Posted by: jxnphx Zn9 AZ (My Page) on Fri, Mar 8, 02 at 0:42 Oh my, oh my! The woman at the nursery said I could have an indoor gardenia in my east-window-garden (morning sun, high level of light the rest of the day), but it sounds like she forgot to tell me I'd need to install a swamp for it, as well. I certainly have plenty of heat for it, here on the low desert. I may be joining the ranks of the guilty gardenia group: I'm not likely to "mist" the miserable thing, nor am I likely to change my habits in on-going care (I am sadly irregular about watering and feeding my only other plant--a low-maintenance Madagascar Palm--dracena). I prepared the soil well enough though (a standard potting soil mixed with half-again as much peat moss), I placed the plant "high" in the middle of the pot, added a layer of peat moss on the top, and covered it all with some additional organic mulch, watered it in with an "acid" feeding, and set it above a large, relatively deep saucer with plenty of water for evaporation. I may have misunderstood the nursery lady's comment about the roots, though, because I removed a great deal of the soil from the root ball and treated the roots with hormone before placing it in the new pot and soil mix. I read in the messages above that this plant may not have liked that messing about with its roots. I believe I'll acquire one of those devices that gives a reading of the humidity, to see just how dry my window garden area really is. We'll see what happens. While I may be capable of sustaining this thing's life for a short while, after reading all of this, I'm not planning on much success with it. I tend to move on to other projects, and I'm afraid the poor thing will have to shift for itself more than it is constitutionally capable. Of course, reading about the success of those who largely ignored their gardenia gives me some hope. That's more my style. At least I have a good excuse for turning the AC down to 70 starting in April. I just don't think the local power usage police are going to understand it when I tell them that my astronomical power draw is necessary for the health of a plant. This is going to be expensive emotionally and monetarily. Who would have thought a trip to the nursery would result in such bondage? · Posted by: Joanmary_z10 z10 Ft. L. Fl. (My Page) on Fri, Mar 8, 02 at 13:16 Oh, what a wonderful laugh this has been! My poor old gardenia is there in Florida, with no one to care for it, depending on the sprinkler system to 'do its thing' and I have no clue what is happening to it. However I have my dark moments when I can see the Christmas lights decorating its bare twigs come December! Taking it that I will be using its twigs as mulch sometime soon, I have bought as a replacement, the African Gardenia. Now I wonder if this is in the same category? Here's to Gardenias who can take neglect!! · Posted by: jxnphx Zn9 AZ (My Page) on Sat, Mar 9, 02 at 15:31 I discussed my newly acquired gardenia issue with my elder sister who, smirking, told me it would probably do me good to have something to worry about. I can only think she was being complimentary about my faultless children and long-ago departed harpy of a wife. She herself has a half-dozen off-spring who provide her with plenty of heart-rending despair. Just in case she was being a smart-ass though, I bought my plant an ultrasonic humidifier which pumps 2.6 gallons of water vapor into the air each day, and I hurried to the used book store and increased my holdings in James Lee Burke (setting: southern Louisiana). I suppose I could have picked up some Faulker, as well, but he's so damned hard to read. I can't stand Tennessee Williams. I am thinking that a few dark and decadent thought-waves might make the gardenia feel a little more at home here in the bright, parched protestant desert southwest. Although it's only been a couple of days, I'm sure it's looking a little better than when I brought it home from the nursery; but just the same, I'm going to keep my eye on a new leaf that is looking a little yellowish. I don't want my dear sister to have the last laugh. · Posted by: BarbC coastal SC (My Page) on Fri, Apr 12, 02 at 15:53 LOL - I have tears rolling down my face and flooding the den. I have 2 unknown variety gardenias that I bought at HD 4 years ago. Since then, I have done ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to them and yet they thrive. They survived the great flood of '99 (were under 6 FEET of nasty swamp/river water and were still green 3 months later when the water finally went away) They were only 1ft tall at the time, so literally had 5ft of nasty black water on top of them. I even had to pick dried toilet paper off them, as the flood had taken the contents of 1000 septic tanks along its path. Those two gardenias and the roses were the only plants to survive that mess. Anyway, once I could finally walk through my yard again (without sinking up to my eyeballs in slimy mud) I dug those suckers up and moved them to my new (dry) house (roses too). They are still there and doing beautifully in full southern afternoon sun. I do ABSOLUTELY NOTHING special to them. I don't even ater then during droughts. Maybe that's the secret? The guy across the street has a couple and he also does ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to his and his are even nicer than mine. Perhaps we are killing these plants with kindness? Maybe what they really want is to just be left alone?
...See More
My Stupidest Garden Mistake - or - We Were Once All Newbies
Q
Comments (0)
Many thanks to ChrisMD for saving this excellent thread which reminds us that we all make mistakes. Those mistakes are often funny and always a learning opportunity! * Posted by: PattiA6290 7b ) on Sat, Feb 9, 02 at 8:17 A friend of mine had her son-in-law plant several hundred tulips for her one year. That next spring none of them came up. Miffed she was gonna return them to the nursery where she buys all of her plants. After she started digging them up she notice he had planted them all up side down. lol * Posted by: Iris_gal z9 CA (My Page) on Sat, Feb 9, 02 at 1:52 Humorous now, but not then. I had a salad ready for company but had forgotten to pull up green onions earlier in the day. I knew where they were in the dark and in the kitchen began slicing - hmmm, don't look quite right - a taste confirmed they were not onions! I'd pulled up young Dutch iris. The 2 are not planted in proximity now. * Posted by: ilovecountrylife z5 MI on Sat, Feb 9, 02 at 14:44 the very first year I started gardening was when I bought my first house. The previous owner had a 3' by 3' bed where she started seeds. I decided I was going to make it into a herb garden. I bought $50 worth of herb plants, chives, basil, tarragon, thyme, oregano, sage, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc. I planted them ALL in that little tiny 3'X 3' bed. Needless to say they crowded each other out and only the strongest few survived. I still laugh when I think about it. * Posted by: Karenga 7 on Sat, Feb 9, 02 at 20:07 What a great post!! I make many many mistakes, so now I feel a little better. I tried digging up tulip bulbs one year, speared every one but two. I don't bother with them anymore!! Planted a wildflower bed, then heavily mulched it. Tried starting some seeds in flats, forgot the drainholes. Planted some huge flowers at the front of my border. Just a few examples. Unfortunately that is just scratching the surface. ha ha. * Posted by: Janet 5 SE MI on Sat, Feb 9, 02 at 20:51 So many mistakes! Sunlovers in shade, tall in front, weeding out plants I want, I can go on and on! * Posted by: plantynut 7 Long Island on Sun, Feb 10, 02 at 8:23 I admired Carpet Rose in my favorite nursery for 2 summers. Finally last summer I bought one and put it in a flower bed in front of my house. What a mistake. It was too sprawling, the thorns are killers and flowering was less than spectacular. I plan to yank it this spring. * Posted by: Karen_in_4 Mpls 4 on Sun, Feb 10, 02 at 8:32 Was cleaning up the seeds shed by my Dutch Elm tree off the sidewalk. Thinks I to myself, "We don't throw away things that can decompose and turn to dirt." So I throw hundreds and thousands of seed pods onto my rock garden. Spent the entire remainder of the summer pulling little elm tree sproutings out of the garden. Doh! * Posted by: Shirleb 7b TX on Sun, Feb 10, 02 at 9:40 I have made MANY mistakes but the biggest is.... I have sandy soil and when I bought this lot (blank slate) I was thrilled to get a beautiful yard started. I immediately laid out the beds, went to all the nurseries and started planting like an obsessed woman. After two years of poor growth, gallons of fertilizer, and humongous water bills, I took a step back. I had to rip out all of my plantings, took a good soil analysis, hauled in truck loads of compost , added greensand and soil conditioner. I've replanted but made a wondrous discovery. Originally I only found an occasional earthworm, during the replanting I found wonderful colonies of big earthworms. * Posted by: Byron 4a/5b NH on Sun, Feb 10, 02 at 18:03 I am only and advanced beginner, Been gardening for a tad over 1/2 century. IE There are over 50 diseases that can infect a tomato plant, I can name a doz, there are over 100,000 species of bugs on this plant, 20,000 have been named, Aphids have 4,000 subspecies, I can name about 10. I think the biggest mistake that new gardeners make is not asking about problems when they find it. The net makes it a lot easier than the days of no net, no county agents, no plant problem books in the library. If the local nursery didn't know it, you were out of luck. * Posted by: Iris_gal z9 CA on Mon, Feb 11, 02 at 3:55 I remembered another salad one. Loving fresh ingredients, I picked the curly parsley at the last moment (no pesticides in that garden) and began snipping it over the company salad. It began moving? Baby green aphids! Aughh! The most stupid thing I've done though, is to plant a shrub at the south end of an east facing rose bed - in three years it cast so much shade that 2 roses had trouble blooming. That was really stupid, especially because I'd had a tall Juniper removed for that very reason! * Posted by: Philipw2 7 MD on Mon, Feb 11, 02 at 22:54 Planting a 50 foot photinia hedge in partial shade. It has gotten very leggy which kind of defeats the purpose of a hedge. Moral: for big projects be dead sure about your plant choice. * Posted by: mary11 6B/7 on Tue, Feb 12, 02 at 16:25 1. Not amending my hard, clay soil and planting a bunch of expensive perennials in it. 2. Buying plants that don't do well in my region. * Posted by: Diana_in_Wisconsin Zone 4 WI on Wed, Feb 13, 02 at 15:46 I've been gardening for about 20 years now. Sometimes I'm still really dumb. My MIL gave me a beautiful German Statice one season, dug from her garden. I rushed right home and planted it...too deep! I don't know what I was thinking! I planted it so deep that I covered up all the lower leaves and I snuffed the poor little thing. Duh! And also, planting a few things in the wrong places, and making the mistake of planting mint! What the heck was I thinking? LOL! It's going this spring...if I can get rid of it, that is. * Posted by: lavatera 5a on Fri, Feb 15, 02 at 11:30 Planted GIANT marigolds that I started from seeds. The bed included many other wonderful flowers that I too had started from seed. They were quickly mauled by the amazon marigold. Finally found the original seed packet and read that it could get up to 4 feet tall! It looked so bad all summer right smack dab in front of my house. YUCK. Moved to a new house this year and I'm just waiting to see what my next mistakes will be. They're always good for a laugh! * Posted by: josiemmmm 3 on Fri, Feb 15, 02 at 16:07 The first year I got the planting bug, I bought some seed starter kit greenhouses, with BIG BIG plans of how I was going to have HUNDREDS of plants to plant in my yard when I was done! I started them in...oh...let's see, April? And they were all perennials! And I had no idea what I was doing, so I only stuck them in the window, and when they came up I roasted the poor little things. Plus, no matter what, we all know that grow lights are usually needed. Of course they got fried, or leggy, and most died. The sweet peas I planted looked great, except everyday when I came home from work I would find another flat nibbled down by my cats! Terrified that they would get sick (and angry that they were eating my best crop), I put them up on my fireplace ledge. They just jumped up, knocked them down and ate them all up. Never got sick once, but I had a huge mess to clean up. The few plants that managed to live, well, I planted them out in the garden one day...without hardening them off...in the middle of the afternoon...under a blazing sun! lol Needless to say I got ONE plant out of all that. Brave little sucker. I also made the huge mistake of planting two Lilacs way too close to each other. They were so little when I bought them, that it seemed just fine to put them THREE FEET apart. Now they are growing into each other, and it's only been 2 years. Plus I planted another large shrub next to them, again, a few feet away. It is going to be a mess. I have some digging to do! One summer I babied a poppy plant, only to be informed that it was a weed! I pulled it up and there was the poppy, much smaller, behind it. I fertilized my 'hansa' rose the minute I planted it in the ground. The poor thing was so lush and happy when I bought it. Then all the leaves crisped and I realized what I had done. luckily it is a tough rose, and recovered nicely, even blooming for me! Whew! * Posted by: nygarden z6 NY on Fri, Feb 15, 02 at 22:36 I bought a caladium from Home Depot the first year I started gardening. It was truly beautiful. Every time I looked at it I thought of the Caribbean!!! I replanted it in a terracotta pot and that plant was the star of my garden -- not too many things were working that first year!!!! Well, as fall came and the leaves fell off completely I thought it died. I decided to reuse the pot for another plant and used a sharp trowel to dig out the dirt out. To my surprise, I dug right through the heart of the bulb, which was still very much alive. That was the year I added the word "dormant" to my vocabulary!!! Gosh, I miss that plant! to this day my heart is broken. * Posted by: gourd z8/9 CA ) on Sat, Feb 16, 02 at 18:34 I just started gardening about 1 1/2 years ago, and thinking how much I loved Zucchini, planted over 50 plants. Oh my god, they were everywhere and my family was getting tired of eating it that year. Got cuttings and put them in the potting soil up-side-down. To date, I am constantly learning everyday from the Gardenweb.. Thanks to everyone here. * Posted by: Marisha 6OH on Sun, Feb 17, 02 at 20:47 One year my husband brought home a truckload of grass clippings from work, in big plastic bags. Oh, thrill! We could use them for mulch in the vegetable garden......little did we know how many dandelion seeds were hidden in all those grass clippings...until the next spring when they all bloomed! = * Posted by: suzegarden 5mo on Sun, Feb 17, 02 at 21:18 Last year another gardener told me if I wanted my plants to get really huge, go to the feed store and get a big bag of nitrogen. So i did. Put it all over my garden. On the leaves, everywhere. Killed about half of everything, particularly some expensive perennials that I started the year before. Won't take advice from this gardener again. * Posted by: MrsBeasley 4a Northern Ont on Wed, Feb 20, 02 at 21:56 My MIL had a big, beautiful garden on the side of a hill, and as her family was getting smaller, she offered me all the space I wanted. I planted a lot of vegetables, but the mistake I made was that I planted the whole packet of turnip (rutabaga) seeds. I had a row of turnip 50 feet long. I had the nicest crop of turnip you could imagine. There was only my husband and myself to eat them, but I know lots of people that like them, I could give some away. When it came time to harvest them, I worked my heart out. I'd cut off the root and leaves, and fill the wheelbarrow, trot the wheelbarrow down the row and pile the turnips on the grass. I worked for hours! Finally, I was done, I took the knife into the house and washed it off, and went back out to the garden to admire my turnips. I had a pile of turnips as tall as I am. I was almost up to this great pile when a few turnips at the bottom of the pile moved, the whole lot of them started rolling down the hill. I was chasing after them, I'd gather a few in my arms and when I'd reach for another the ones in my arms would get away and continue down the hill. I must have made quite a sight, because my brother-in-law was laughing at me. "You'd better catch them," he called, "They're going to wipe out the neighbor's house"! I eventually got them rounded up, but it turns out everyone doesn't like turnip the way I do! :-) I wound up serving turnip at least once a week in every way you can imagine. I served them boiled, fried, in stew, I cooked them up and added pumpkin pie spice and made fake pumpkin pie! I thought it was rather inventive of me, but it was the turnip fritters that finally did me in. My husband took one bite and gasped. He had thought that he was biting into an apple fritter. He said he didn't care if he NEVER ate another turnip! I was NOT to grow them ever again! I guess he just doesn't have a sense of humor! LOL * Posted by: Jannie z7 LI NY on Thu, Feb 21, 02 at 19:55 I tried to grow daisies in full shade. They died after several months, never came back again. I now read every plant tag carefully and look for those little sun and shade circles. Don't try to fool Mother Nature! * Posted by: Nancyusn z8 NC on Sun, Feb 24, 02 at 21:22 Mrs Beasly, I'm sorry to say, I was laughing so hard I had tears! My whole career in the U.S. Navy I dreamed of a veggie garden, when my husband and I retired and went to South Dakota I dug right in. The Corn on the Cob had a bug and the cucumbers were overwhelming, there were not enough hours in the day to keep them from rotting. No more cukes for me! * Posted by: Lees_Haven z7TN on Mon, Feb 25, 02 at 21:28 My first year of gardening I had a "cow weed", the tall ones you see growing in cow pastures in Tn., come up in my new bed. I didn't know what the stuff I had planted was supposed to look like, and I feed and watered that plant faithfully. I could not get that sucker to bloom. I literally fell out when a friend of mine told me what had come up in the middle of my flowers. It was almost 12 feet then. Needless to say I got online that winter and the following spring I didn't plant it unless I could identify it. * Posted by: NancyD 6 Rochester, NY on Tue, Feb 26, 02 at 8:43 Some of these stories remind me of my first days as a gardener, but I continue to make mistakes now and then, only now I refer to them as my little "experiments!" I don't believe there's any such thing as a "stupid" garden mistake. Mistakes can be your best teacher and what makes you a better gardener. * Posted by: pondwelr z5 WI on Wed, Feb 27, 02 at 11:23 I think Mrs. Beasley’s turnip story is one of the funniest I've ever heard. You really should submit to OG or some other gardening magazine. In my 30 years of gardening have made so many mistakes that I'd be hard pressed to name the stupidest. I once nurtured a burdock thinking it was rhubarb. That was about the hardest to eradicate. In my current new house, I've planted all these small shrubs and trees too close together. Some of us never learn! * Posted by: GloryBee 8 ) on Wed, Feb 27, 02 at 16:01 I fell in love with chocolate mint the first time I smelled it and decided to buy a couple of dozen of them to fill our bay window bed so it would smell incredible every time it was brushed walking by. I never knew how invasive it was and how far even a couple of plants spread. We decided to take it out because it was even growing throw those interlocking bricks you can buy that were lining the bay window :) It was taking too long pulling it. Strong little plants! So, I rotatilled them. HUGE MISTAKE! No one told me they can divide by the roots also. Heidi S~ * Posted by: francee 6b on Sat, Mar 2, 02 at 21:57 Laughed sooo hard at the turnip story .... My cheeks are still hurting!! One year I planted 30 foxgloves and anxiously awaited their blooming in the following year and not one was to be found. DH had pulled them all up thinking they were weeds. I lost a lot of perennials that year and now DH is only allowed to weed dandelions!! * Posted by: LisaZ10 z10FL on Sun, Mar 3, 02 at 2:44 I will never forget the time I killed almost ALL of my 2"-3" tomato, pepper, eggplant and herb seedlings - nearly 300 of them. I watered them and sprayed the leaves with a concentrated fertilizer w/sea kelp 5-9-5. Didn't follow the directions properly! For the seedlings I was supposed to dilute the previously diluted solution again. Gave it to them full strength and woke up to little stems with burned, wilted leaves. Ohhhh!, I had to start all over again, more seeds, more Jiffy-mix, more WORK, more TIME, more MONEY and more aggravation. Planting all those seeds is hard work! My garden was a little later than I planned. Of course I felt stupid, because following directions is something I was supposed to have learned a long time ago! * Posted by: NikkiJ ACT Australia on Mon, Mar 4, 02 at 5:39 I am so glad have found this site, and in particular, this forum! I've only been gardening for about 5 months (never had a garden I could do anything much in before! I'm still renting but the yard here has so much potential!!). I've already learnt soooo much and had so many good laughs!! The silliest thing I've done so far was planting sunflowers in the back yard - my 6 y.o son begged me to! Only thing is, the sun spends most of the day shining on... yes... the BACK of my house! Oh well, at least the neighbors have a nice view of them over the fence... * Posted by: Ruiadh 5/6 Toronto on Thu, Mar 7, 02 at 18:46 Great stories, everyone.... but I betcha I can beat ‘em. Spring-flowering bulbs... plant ‘em in spring, right? Late summer, about 7 years ago, I moved into my first house. It came complete with an overgrown garden ? of course, at the time I didn’t realize it was overgrown. That’s another story. I also became the beneficiary of the previous occupant’s subscription to the late, lamented Cruickshank’s bulb & perennial catalogue. Put those two facts together with someone who had never so much as pulled a weed before and you would have found me trotting off Cruickshank’s tiny retail operation in early April of the following year. Although the staff tried very hard to explain the rudiments of gardening to me, and even though virtually all of their operation was dedicated to mail-order service, I was so pig-headedly determined to have the bulbs I coveted that they let me buy a few gazillion daffodils and lilies, a bunch of glads, and, oh yes, a bare-root clematis. ‘Bluebird.’ By the time I got home, the sun had sunk low in the sky and it seemed too cold to plant my goodies. They sat in their bags in the enclosed and dark and unheated back porch for, oh, say, 3 weeks. The bulbs were eventually planted in the ground, in standard-issue Toronto clay, and the clematis got bunged in, what at the time I believed was a LARGE, terracotta pot. It?s a testament to the quality of Cruickshank?s products (Heather R and Indigo be damned!) that about half the glads appeared as did most of the lilies (in fact a few followed me to my new house last February) and the daffs showed up the following spring. But what about the clematis? Well, the ?Bluebird? variety had been chosen ‘cause the catalogue said it did well in pots and there was lovely photo to prove it. My poor little clem actually grew quite well for several weeks, despite it?s southern exposure in a baking hot terra cotta pot that was really only about 10 inches deep & maybe the same wide. I?ve been apologizing indiscriminately to clematises (clematisii? clematisoi?) ever since. * Posted by: Shirleb 7b TX on Thu, Mar 7, 02 at 23:42 Reading about the turnips reminded me of my husband, the tomato king. Our first vegetable garden, he planted a whole row of about 25 tomato plants. When it came time to harvest, I was wild with trying to come up with ways to use them all up. Juicing, canning, soups, and even made homemade ketchup which the kids refused to eat because it wasn't Heinz. I couldn't give them away because everybody else grew them also. I was completely overwhelmed to say the least. The following year he insisted on planting even more. One day when he was at work, I went to the garden with a kitchen knife and explored the root zone of quite a few plants. He decided that the cutworms were having a field day and proceeded to collar and spray like a madman. It was a sad thing that he never defeated those cutworms that year or for years thereafter. * Posted by: CarrieIN on Sun, Mar 10, 02 at 8:54 Thinking that I was pruning my tomato plants I removed the yellow blossoms!!!! * Posted by: flxabl z5 IL on Sun, Mar 10, 02 at 13:41 You may have to think about this one. We had an old ugly concrete patio/walkway leading to the door of our kitchen. We busted up the concrete and put in a mulched flower bed with stepping stones leading to the door. We have kids AND pets. We also had a mulched kitchen. * Posted by: gnomey 7b SC on Wed, Mar 13, 02 at 13:26 I spent all last Spring digging and planting and coddling all of my new little plants at my new home. Then we decided to have a pool put in. I didn't realize until afterwards that pool installers aren't sympathetic to flowerbeds or the lawn; most of my babies in the front of the house were destroyed. Then there was the tree at the rear of the house that needed to come out - a huge tree. With the equipment coming in and out on that job the hydrangeas and azaleas on the other side of the house got crushed. The wood got stacked in the backyard on top of lilies and glads. So I'm starting over, hoping that I won't have to have any more non-gardening workman here. I guess the moral of the story is to plan ahead and get your plants out of any potential paths that workmen or equipment might have to use. * Posted by: DogHouseMom 5 ) on Fri, Mar 15, 02 at 20:39 One day while leaving my office I noticed a 7' Ficus (Ben) sitting on the dock. I asked why it was there and they said they were dumping it, and if I wanted it ... I could have it. Well sure ... I had never had one and figured the sucker was 7' tall it was surely healthy and would survive! As I was carrying it into the house my aunt (green thumb aunt) saw me and came to check it out. She found slugs in the plant. Well my mom heard "slugs" and banned the poor thing to the basement (right next to a So. facing window though). Aunt Gin gave me slug instructions - use so many parts water to so many parts dishwashing liquid and water it. Because I had taken the plant home in the Winter she also suggested that I tent it to reduce shock, and told me to put a large plastic garbage bag over the top after watering to give it a greenhouse effect. I found the biggest plastic garbage bag I could find, tented it, watered it with the soap solution, and waited. Little by little the thing started to shrivel and die. In a little over a week this seemingly healthy (and now slug free) tree was shriveled into firewood. Why oh why didn't she tell me to choose a CLEAR plastic bag instead of the black one I had chosen???? * Posted by: SusanC Z9/Sunset 17 on Fri, Mar 15, 02 at 21:22 When my husband and I bought our first house, we were very excited about being able to have a garden. We went out and bought a ton of perennials and got ready to plant them. After much discussion, we decided that the planting holes should be EXACTLY the same size as the pot the plant came in and that we should try not to disturb the plant's root ball in any way when planting. We carefully chiseled out the correct sized holes and squeezed the plants into them. Needless to say, we had a lot of unhappy, sad looking, root bound plants... * Posted by: Kat_G 5b/6a Ontario on Sun, Mar 17, 02 at 19:08 I decided i was going to grow parsley this year, not having heard any of the issues around parsley growing. I used earth that had come from my grandmother's garden to start the seedlings. Planted them in a clear plastic dome container and waited. My grandmother told me in the meantime that she never had any luck with parsley and that i should make sure it's in a warm place. I put it on top of the fridge and I waited some more and voila! a week and a half later i had... parsley! I was so ecstatic, thinking that i had actually grown something that my grandmother couldn't! As the little sprouts grew, I realized that I recognized those leaves but it was not parsley. I had cultivated two beautiful little morning glory seedlings. humph. I have since done a little research (it didn't say so on the package!) and found out that parsley takes between 4 - 5 weeks to germinate (all of those trips to see the devil and back!). There's still hope; maybe... (I'm now in week 3) * Posted by: Meghane 7b NC on Mon, Mar 18, 02 at 17:48 Trying to grow hybrid tea roses in humid NC is about the dumbest thing I've ever done. You can't win, between the black spot and Japanese beetles I had tiny moving shiny green "buds" on top of naked sticks all year. I was lucky and never had aphids. Got rid of them this spring and planting cannas, ginger, and an assortment of other "tropicals." Oh, every year I take out all my overwintering tropicals approximately 6 weeks before the last frost date, then complain profusely about having to either drag them all back inside (a 4-5 hour ordeal), or cover them with blankets and/or pots. Of course this year everything is so big, I can only choose to drag them all inside. So you all know how I'll be spending my Thursday evening. We have 38 degree nights predicted. ARGH! I'll never learn! * Posted by: talkingflower z5 MA USA on Mon, Mar 18, 02 at 23:32 Well, I live at the historic site of THE WORLD'S TALLEST PRINCESS PINE! That's right... I thought I'd transplant a little pine tree from the back to the front of the house. Absent-mindedly dug up a cute little fluff of a tree and planted it boldly out by the road's edge, and to be sure no one drove over it, gave it a tall, red-reflector marker. My neighbor thought it was quite amusing. She broke it to me gently that, yes, that was a very nice little tree, but...not a tree. Princess pine only grows to about 6" tall and is used in making wreaths. Now I know... * Posted by: katbird Z6 SW Ohio USA on Fri, Mar 29, 02 at 17:45 First spring in brand new home, hubby got tired of helping me edge and mulch the beautiful snowball bushes in the backyard and decided he would get "fancy" with it. Goes to the local hardware store and buys about 5 gallons of RoundUp and some new pruning shears. I was in the house and not paying attention... big mistake... went to tell him dinner was ready and found that he had trimmed the snowballs to look like cute little trees with a big "pouf" on top.. !! Ok, that wasn't so bad.. He also however, had taken the round-up and sprayed all around the mulched bed area underneath.. from the trunks out to about a 6 foot circumference around, with the idea that it would be forever grass & weed free!! I grabbed a garden hose and tried drowning the things to keep them from dying and biting my tongue to keep from losing my garden helper. Well the snow balls went through a period of about two weeks and a half of curling dried up leaves but they lived!! Unfortunately, the grass back to the house where DH had walked back with the round up on the bottom of his shoes didn't.. We had a human foot print path of dead grass that the neighbor kids all loved to play along that summer till it grew back! My Stupidest Garden Mistake was using Cheap Labor!! LOL * Posted by: DianeZone4 zone 4a on Wed, May 1, 02 at 15:41 Hope it's not too late to post a followup to this - when I lived in Missouri years ago, we bought a home on five acres which came with an old tractor and cultivator, etc. My husband got all excited about using the tractor to plant a huge one acre garden, which he would weed with the tractor attachments. Unfortunately, he didn't realize that the attachments didn't match, in terms of row width, so we had to do all the weeding by hand! Finally, the kids and I picked out a patch to weed and let the rest go. That part produced the nicest tomatoes I've ever seen, but the rest was a one acre disaster! Diane * Posted by: alagard alaz8 on Thu, May 2, 02 at 6:45 Well, mine was in trying to grow the potato vine, some call it air potato. My Mother grows them along her front porch every summer for shade and they get very full. Well, the 1st year, I planted mine when she did and waited and waited... nothing. So she said dig them up - maybe you planted them upside down. Sure enuff they had been to china and were on there way back up. So, this year, determined not to get them upside down, I took some of the potatoes that were already sprouting roots on the shelf in her shed. Can't go wrong, right? Everyone knows, the roots go DOWN, right!? Well, same thing - her's were sprouting, mine weren't So I dug up a small one in her garden and what a surprise! The roots AND plant grow out of the TOP! Weird. So back home I go, to dig them up AGAIN. Finally they are growing and I might just get what I'm after. Needless to say the DH laughed his head off when I once again planted them upside down! * Posted by: blooms4me Ga8a on Thu, May 2, 02 at 23:50 When I got married and we bought our first house I was going to be the perfect housewife. Can veggies,etc. SO.. I picked out a spot to grow our garden. I had heard you could put newspaper over the grass and after awhile it would kill the grass and I could start my garden. So, I gathered all our newspapers, laid them down and put a few rocks on them so they wouldn't blow away. We were both in the AF reserves and had to go out of town for the weekend. Well, we got back Sun afternoon and newspapers were ALL OVER the place. All over my 5 acres and against the fence of the neighbors pasture. Took me hours to gather all that paper. I was so proud of myself for remembering that tip, but apparently they said water the paper, and put lots of mulch on it which I neglected to do. My new husband just stood there laughing at me and shaking his head. (probably wondering how he ended up with such an idiot) * Posted by: Lisa_Ann z5 IN on Fri, May 3, 02 at 22:10 About 22 years ago my husband and I bought our first house in the country and decided to plant a HUGE vegetable garden. We had the garden spot plowed up and my husband did the rotatilling. Well, the time came for us to plant the corn. I brought out my little bag of seed corn and placed it by the first row and waited for my husband to finish the tilling. He got too close to the bag and rotatilled over it. I was devastated, so I sat down (wearing short shorts) to pick up the little seeds. I didn't think anything of it until a few days later while sitting at work and I was getting very uncomfortable. Well, needless to say I ended up at the Doctor's office and was diagnosed with a major case of poison ivy - ugh. I still get into poison ivy (where I am not sure) but I sure watch where I sit now. * Posted by: Sandy_W 6 on Sat, May 4, 02 at 8:35 I planted cleomes. I didn't use a soilless mix. I saw new growth coming and was so excited. My cleomes grew great. I noticed some of my cleomes looked different from the others. Confused I took a leaf off of each and went to my favorite nursery. The man who owned the nursery said this is a cleome and this is a weed. Boy was I embarrassed. I can grow some awesome weeds. Now I know to use a sterilized mix. * Posted by: Celestial Z6b/Eagle,ID on Tue, May 7, 02 at 12:03 1) After searching/not finding/asking about seed starting mix, believing the guy at the nursery who told me "they" used Whitney Farms Potting Soil as their seed starting mix [read: TONS of dampening off] 2) Planting roses in the lawn - Hello Mildew! * Posted by: storey_z8b_TX z8b TX on Fri, May 10, 02 at 20:43 NEVER let a younger family member (he was 20, I was 23) help in your garden. We laugh about it now, but ... Anyway, I was busy moving small peppers and veggies from a seeding bed to growing beds and he noticed a few big caterpillars munching on some larger blackberry canes and wanted to help. I told him where the insecticidal soap was, he got it, and sprayed most of the flowering canes. Helpful right? Well two weeks later we found out he picked up the Round Up instead of the soap. Got rid of the bugs though :) * Posted by: Ermine z9CA on Sat, May 11, 02 at 16:54 Although I've been gardening for years I always make stupid mistakes. I'm looking at one right now. 25 HUGE tomato plants that are all indeterminate! These babies will be bearing fruit past Thanksgiving and I'm scheduled for back surgery this summer!! Thank God there are the local food banks to take a lot off my hands as I also went way overboard with the summer squash and chilies too. I can't believe I once again planted a veggie garden this big for just my husband and me. LOL......... * Posted by: poinciana South West on Sat, May 11, 02 at 22:18 What a great thread, just look here if you need a good laugh! The turnip story wins for me. A relative would not touch turnips for years and years because she had to eat them almost exclusively during the war. Apparently, one can also get sick of turnips in a rather short time. :)) I have made many of the above mistakes and then some. These days I am a very experienced gardener as well as a (ahem) ‘professional’ to boot; and still, I keep making mistakes. Most of these come under the, not following my own advice category such as planting things too close, because I don’t like bare ground; subsequently having to move tons of plants while killing a few in the process. The other mistake I constantly make is that my greedy little garden coveting brain won't let me purchase within bounds. I always buy too much. Imelda coveted shoes; I covet plants. As a consequence, I have scores of little plants or bulbs that are never planted due to a lack of time or energy. At this writing, there is a whole box of winter and summer bulbs in the garage, all have sprouted. Everyday I look at them and say, Yes, yes, tomorrow, I'll get to you. I see them sadly beckoning to me, like marooned sailors on a raft without water. These days, swallowing my pride, I use 'little helpers' to ease the hard work. I am learning that no matter how well I think I have explained a procedure it frequently is done incorrectly. Recently I enlisted my young, teen helper to transplant some Vincas into our little wooded area. I suggested he water them first, told him which spade to use, etc. and went to the front garden to deadhead the roses. After a while, I returned to find him sitting on the ground with a hand trowel, scraping out a fist size hole in the hard clay with his bare hands. I then watched in horror as he forced a bare-root Vinca into the hard, unwatered hole and pulled mulch over it. 'Where is the soil that you dug up with the plant?' 'Oh,' he said, 'I shook it all off.' I turned around and sure enough, there was a stack of poor little Vinca plants with their bare roots exposed to the afternoon sun, waiting for 'planting.' Good thing they are tough plants. After further instructions on how to properly transplant, my helper did a nice job. They all looked fine the next day. I just hope it will not be yet another mistake, because Vinca can be invasive. :-> One day I casually mentioned to my husband that I needed to prune the beautiful Virburnum plicatum tomentosum Marisii, which was blocking the front window, (another 'mistake') before transplanting it. I began to prepare dinner and did not notice that my husband had disappeared. After about 20 minutes he came back in, a triumphant look on his face and loppers in hand. 'Where have you been?' Proudly he announced, 'I pruned the Viburnum for you.' I rushed outside, fearing the worst. Gasp! There was the fully-grown Viburnum, its arm size branches lying on the ground, neatly stacked. He had 'pruned' the massive plant completely to the ground. I cried; my hapless husband looked devastated. We nevertheless transplanted it (not without great difficulty, because the roots were huge) and prayed. Miraculously, that Viburnum (after about 4 years) is again fully-grown and had the best horizontal display ever, this year. * Posted by: buckeye_newbie USDA 5 on Tue, May 14, 02 at 15:23 I may have made a mistake... I have just bought a new house complete with overgrown yard and a terraced hillside with LOTS of landscaping. Right away, I noticed tall purple flowers (weeds?) growing right from the tree?s lawn, down the terraces and halfway into the yard. I pulled every single one out by the roots (they came out pretty easy, but had kind of a "creeping" root, especially round the rocky areas). Now I think these might have been phlox. My question is, is phlox a flower or a weed? Is it desirable to have in the garden? This could be my first mistake, but surely won't be my stup
...See More
Quotes 11 - 18 - 17 page 5
Q
Comments (2)
Little girls are cute and small only to adults. To one another they are not cute. They are life-sized. Margaret Atwood Wow, she is a person of many many opinions!
...See More
What words or phrases do you wish you’d never hear again….
Q
Comments (137)
I can see saying "That's a great question" when talking to a group of people, some of whom may have good questions and some of whom may not, but when it is a one-on-one interview, it sounds like stalling and also sounds insincere. In a one-on-one interview, it sounds to me like saying "You've asked a question for which I do not have a good answer." The point is that when it is overused, it loses meaning or sincerity. I think "no problem" in response to "thank you" is possibly a translation of "de nada" from Spanish. People sometimes say "no problema" in Spanish in response to someone saying that they are sorry. I really, really hate hearing people say "You're welcome" when no one has thanked them. If anyone did that to me, I would say, "I'm not thanking you and have no intention of doing so." In Russian, the word for "please" (пожалуйста) is the same word for "you're welcome." That way one could not say "you're welcome" in Russian before being thanked, which is helpful. Does the "C" word rhyme with "cap" but with an "R" in it? That would perhaps describe what goes into a fanny pack.
...See More
neetsiepie
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Oh, zorries...I remember we called them that when I was a kid in Los Angeles.

Yeah, we barbeque (BBQ) everything on the gas grill here. Or it's "Webbered" which is cooked over coals.

We drive on the freeway, but in most parts of Oregon there is only one freeway (Interstate 5) and the rest are highways. In So Cal we called it 'the 5' or 'the 101' or 'the 405'...depending on which freeway you were on.

Clicker for remote, sack for carrying groceries and pasta for spaghetti. And like Terri said, it's 'the coast' here in Oregon.

Our personal family saying was "Aspet!" said very sharply when you were supposed to shut your mouth before someone, usually the person you were talking about behind their back, came near.
cooperbailey
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
zorries! I had forgotten about zorries! I thought my new neighbor had cooler zorries than my thongs! I begged for zorries. got thongs, of course they were just about identical. I don't dare mention thongs around my DD or DS - don't want to put that picture in their poor minds!
I also sometimes use creme rinse,and I remember my Mom saying Hells bells too.As a good southern Mom the first thing she taught me was to make a roux,I didnt know why or Used to say sack for bag, still say clicker, alternate pasta or spaghetti.
I can't quite figure out if we grill, BBQ, or cook out, I alternate or use all of them. There is the beltway or 695 and then there is 95 or 70, or route 40. the rest are named streets even though they may have route(I say root) numbers.
As for accents, I forgot to emphasis the phonetics;its not downy oshun - gotta put in the a-ow. "daowny aoshun"
When we went up among all the Norskys in St. Paul for my DBs wedding everyone thought we all had an old english accent. wth?
Wait, heat lightning is the same thing as regular lightning? there goes the mytery. heck.
The first trip to a gas station(filling station)after we moved here when I was a senior in high school, the attendant asked if he could check my ol. I said no. I went home and asked what is ol? He wanted to check my o-il. ohhh. dang. Might as well can't dance.
golddust
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
We had 'Pop' instead of soda and thongs (zorries) were called 'beach walkers'. We had dinner at lunch and supper at dinner.

When mom would burn her finger, etc., she always said *Gosh Blast It*! My Dad said, *Gull Durn it*. My mom could "talk until the cows come home but it wouldn't do any good."

My dad would fasten a screw real tight. He hated it when some part of a motor got "fast" and wouldn't come apart. "Gull durn it, the screw is fast and I can't get it out."
THOR, Son of ODIN
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago

Click image to see larger size.

"I want a pop... I want a Shasta"

-Lena
2ajsmama
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Of course here in CT you get grinders at Subway (or pizza places). First time I asked for a grinder in DC (college) I got a blank stare. We call the drinks sodas.

We have a "picnic" (even if it's in our backyard, sitting at tables) or a barbeque. But I love real barbeque - got to be vinegar-based though, not tomato sauce for pulled pork. But all those years in DC changed me - I say "you all" (not y'all but I get teased anyway) for plural, though emphasis is "all of you" not "all y'all". And I also eat crab with Old Bay whenever I can get my hands on some blue crabs. Thinned my blood too - I need a sweater except in July and August (and even then need one in public buildings with AC).

DH is from TX, lost most of his accent in the Army, but still changes the "ol" in the cars. I can't even begin to describe how he pronounces "wheel" - to me, his "well" and "wheel" sound the same, and neither of them sounds like either of the words as I know it.

My dad's older brother used to use a "pallow" to sleep on.

My great-aunt used to tell me "Worry is interest on a debt that will never come due." I always wondered if it was really a debt if it didn't come due, and if was, did byou have to pay "interest only" until some day the debt was called in by surprise - can you tell I'm a worrier?

Lallygaggin' is the same as dawdling or dillydallying.

My mom's baby brother was named "Buffer" (shortened to "Buff") when sister a little older than he couldn't say "Buster" - grandpa's nickname for his only boy. Buff is retiring next year - only the family calls him Buff, DW and friends call him Al. Sometimes his nieces and nephews call him "Eubie" (short for Uncle Buff). I guess that's a nickname thrice removed? Or if it four times?

His kids are younger than my older, older than my younger. Of course since I call him Uncle, my kids call him Uncle too. But his kids call me Aunt (that's "Awnt" not "Ant" - the only "Ant" we had was "Ant Toinette" b/c it was too hard to say "Aunt Antoinette", so it sounded like the kids and the adults were calling her the same thing but the kids paused after the first syllable.).

My kids call adult friends Miss Karen or Mr. Barry, never by their first names. My cousins' kids are still trying to figure out what to call me (even though my kids call their parents Aunt and Uncle) - a lot of times they'll call me by my first name but I'm a little uncomfortable with that.
stinky-gardener
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Lenam, how cool is that? Didn't know such a map existed, you mastermind of statistical data, you!

Loved that commercial as a kid! It really did make me pester my mother to buy me Shasta (which according to your map, most of country indeed believes is...pop!)
newdawn1895
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
I was born in Alabama but raised in Michigan. The best of both worlds I always say.

Lynn I remember all those saying and words from Michigan. lol

I still drive on the expressway never on the freeway. I always drank pop but I have a cold drink now. lol

In the south if you want to have a barbeque you will be eating a pork sandwich. If you mention a barbeque in the north, they will drag out the grill.

Everyone calls their mother here in the south, Mama. Does not matter if you are three or ninty three, it's always mama. Same with father and daddy. I can't get use to that, it really bothers me. My mother is 89 and she still refers to her mother as Mama, gads. lol

Up north they called a scarf a Ba-boska. I know I am spelling that wrong, it is polish. If your going outside in that snow put your baboska on your head or you will freeze to death, gads. And I'm not even polish, it still gives me the chills. lol

In the rural areas of the south older more country people will use a ONE after a sentence. For example, I am going to the movies or rent a video, one.
hhireno
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Here are some from my family &/or my neck of the woods (the northeast US)

"here's your hat, what's your hurry" - explains the feeling that you get when your hosts are trying to get the guests to leave, yet make the guest think it's their idea. Similar to "the bum's rush" meaning to do something to get the bum or hobo to move along.

"they didn't even ask if I had a mouth on" - someone you visited didn't even offer you food or drink.

"don't go breaking my rice bowl" - doing something that would interfere with my source of income. If you break my rice bowl it prevents me from eating.

"I have my face fixed for..." - means you would like to eat a certain item. Example using a new term: "I have my face fixed for T.D.I."

T.D.I. - means ice cream. Like many parents, mine would spell words they didn't want us to know they were discussing. My sister realized ice cream was something they always spelled out so she tried to spell it also.

"it's not the third world" - related to packing & travel. If you forget something or need more or it, you'll be able to buy it when we get to our new location since it's not the 3rd world and there will be stores.

"I wouldn't say no to something sweet" - No matter how much you've already eaten, there's always room for dessert.

"Where do you think you are, Chelsea?" - meaning don't worry, you are not in a bad/rough neighborhood or area. My dad was concerned he forgot to lock the car in front of my Nana's house in Brighton Mass. An uncle said the above & meant don't worry your car is safe here. Naturally, something was stolen from the car that night.
happytobehome
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Daresn't, as in "You daresn't do that", meaning you better not (or dare not) do that.

Redd up - clean up around the house.

"If you don't eat it, I'll rub it on you" - this was the response to asking for a new untried item (usually kid's cereal) at the grocery store as a child. It was a family joke, but when I said it to my child in line at the store, I got a dirty look from another customer.

"A bar of soap?" - this was what you were offered after multiple refusals of the offer of a drink or snack as in "Would you like a glass of water? Milk? Soda? Bar of soap?"

"Don't burn the roast" - this is the response to over-apologizing, as in shut up already. This originated when a relative burned the Sunday roast and apologized til everyone was sick of hearing about it.

"Are you going to the movies?" If someone caught you adjusting your pants because of a wedgie, they would ask "are you going to the movies, because it looks like you're picking your seat."

My husband is from Colorado and says "rune" instead of ruin.

I know there are lots more, but they'll come to me after I hit submit!
jakabedy
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
I'm an Air Force brat, so have lived all over.

My grandparents were all from Indiana and Ohio. Granny had a davenport, pushed shopping carts - "let's go at the grocery." And anything ending with an "ee" sound got shortened. "Quiet everyone, it's Margie on the phone from Hawayuh!" Or "we're going to Cincinnatuh to go at the racetrack."

My grandpa wore dungarees and drove "automobiles" -- not cars.

I now live in Alabama, and like those from Georgia mention, the accents and colloquialisms vary depending on the part of the state. I had a boyfriend from north Alabama on the Tennessee border. He didn't say pop, soda, etc. To him it was a "cold drink." And a quarter was a "case quarter."

Then I had a coworker from a mining community in central Alabama. If she wanted you to touch something, she'd say "come feel of it."

As a northerner, I ate peas. You know, the little round green ones? Well, in the South, there are LOTS of different peas, so those little green ones are "English peas." The thing at the grocery is a buggy and the drink is usually a "Coke" regardless of the actual flavor. Also, you water your garden with the "hosepipe."

But my favorite has got to be the verb "tump." As in, "She was pushin' that buggy down the ramp and then the whole thing tumped over."
golddust
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
"Lallygaggin' is the same as dawdling or dillydallying."

Yes. That's what it mean to mom too. Only if you were going 'out' with a boy, that line had an extra twist. (I didn't listen and I made that bed too. Big time!)

"The first baby can come anytime. The second baby takes nine months." Uh huh.
johnmari
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
DH reminded me that I forgot one of his favorites... instead of falling head over heels, we go "@$$ over teakettle"!

Even though I'm in my late 30s I too still feel very strange addressing my elders by their first names unless I've been invited to do so, and it grinds my gears for youngsters to call me by my first name unless they're related to me or they might as well be. I've given parents introducing me to their children for the first time by my first name a slightly hairy eyeball and "I prefer Mrs. M________, please". Call me old-fashioned, it's fine.
terezosa / terriks
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
To me what is worse than kids calling adults by their first name is kids calling their parents by their first names. It also bugs me to hear adults calling their parents by their first names. I'd take mama and daddy over that any day. And I'm not from the south.
golddust
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
I am always addressed by first name. Especially by little kids. 'Deby' can run around the house crazy dancing while singing (badly) "In the jungle, the mighty jungle, the lion sleeps tonight. Bah woom bah woom bah woom bah woom..." 'Mrs So and So' just could not get away with that, IMO.

I am called 'Mom' now but used to be 'Mommy' when the kids were young. I used to be called just 'Grammy' by the GC until our oldest GD was 2 1/2. I offered her a Graham Cracker while she was visiting me. After I gave it to her, she said, "These are just like you. Grammy Crackers." From that day on, that became my name. I'm 'Grammy Crackers' to all the grandchildren.

DH is 'Papa' to all. Both kids and grandkids call him that. Even my Sandy calls him 'Papa Robert'. He's Italian. I call him 'Rob' or 'Robert'. He's never been called Bob. I often forget Bob is a nickname for Robert. When people who barely know him refer to him as Bob and I don't know who they are talking about.
littledog
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Born in Virginia, lived briefly in Texas, and now reside in Oklahoma. A nice blend of Southern and Western:

"Tea" always means sweet tea, unless you say "plain"
Coke means soda - you have to specify what brand. "Sody-pop" is what my Granny called her Coke.
We sit on the couch, hang curtains at the windows, and if the power goes out, we have coal oil lamps handy. "Y'all" is the group, and "All y'all" means the whole group, even the folks not present.

What else do they say in this neck of the woods? I tell you what. A man who's been beat with the ugly stick is homely but if he also can't carry a tune in a bucket or dance a lick I reckon he's pretty bad off. But get him riled up enough to have a falling out, he might lose his religion and he's liable to show up loaded for bear. If he's lucky, he won't get the worst of it and be laid up long. But if not, and he ends up looking like he was rode hard and put up wet, he'll cowboy up (be a man, get tough), lick his wounds (NOT literally!), take a bath, and shine up like a new penny. Then I figure he'll go to town and have a larapin' supper. They'll be a mess of greens (turnip or collards, not spinach), his steak will be as tender as a new Bride's heart and he'll be soppin' the gravy. He does his damnedest to be polite, says "Ma'am" and "Sir" and "Much obliged". He thinks nothing of pulling over to change a tire for a woman stranded on the side of the road, and if he can't pull over right then, he'll take the next exit, and come back on the access road to get there 'cause his heart's in the right place.

A few more:
cornfed - BIG

Lies so much he has to hire someone to call his dogs

Barkin' up the wrong tree (good coonhounds NEVER do this)
oh, and speaking of coons; there's a coon's age, which is a long time.

don't have a dog in this fight. (no reason for me to get involved in your dispute)
a hole so big you could throw a dog through it - bad workmanship, or a dumb argument in a debate

comin' up a cloud - fixin' to rain

Beat you half to death - as part of a rowdy brood, we heard that one a lot growing up.

I can think of more, but I don't want to take all the good ones. BTW, here's a little quiz for you if you need some help getting your directionals straight. ;^)

Here is a link that might be useful: Yankee or Dixie Quiz
THOR, Son of ODIN
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Thanks stinky-gardener, I can't help but be a data geek.

The survey linked below looked at regional variations in vowel pronunciations, and terms used.

-Lena

Here is a link that might be useful: Dialect Survey from Harvard (HAH-vahd?)
Mimou-GW
Original Author
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Great links! I took the Yankee-Dixie quiz and was surprised that so many responses were linked to the Great Lakes region or Michigan specifically. I grew up in Michigan and I guess all these years later I still speak Michigese.

When we lived in CA we always had a gardener, now we have a landscape service. Same job, different term.
palimpsest
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
I don't know why we did this, and I have only heard my siblings say this besides me:

Mom or Dad: "Behave!"

Us: "But I *am* being Have!" (pronounced Hayve)

I still find myself saying it this way as a 47 year old.
cooperbailey
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Heres a made up phrase we kids used to say, even yell out from behind a shrub or out of the car window.As far as I know anyway, remember the wreck of the Hesperus. Keep in mind I was the oldest of 3 at 4years old. We would say " Hey Buster with the custard on your nose" and double up with belly laughs. We would say it to big kids walking by, dogs or each other over and over and over. go figure.
Oh and here it's a## over tincups. why tin cups? thats a picture. My DH always says automobile and I couldn't figure where he got that one. It's a car.

BTW fair warning, speaking of the old bay and crabs( the good way!) if you see Maryland Crabcakes on a menu anywhere but in Maryland, take a pass.They most assuredly are not. Not even close. kinda the difference between tube steak and sirloin.
First time I visited Massachusetts about 30 some years ago in college. There were neon signs up and down the business route in Springfield advertizing "Hot Italin Grinders" I asked my dad if they were strippers. I hade never heard of a submarine sandwich until we moved to MD from AZ- about a year before visiting Mass.
palimpsest
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
This isn't really a familial saying but people were mentioning their grandmothers. --And there has been an increasing trend in Wall Words or sayings especially in kitchens. My grandmother had a sign in her kitchen that said

Illegitimi non Carborundum

Latin for "Don't let the B45tards wear you down." Not quite the same as "live,laugh,love"
2ajsmama
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
littledog - I understood every word but "larapin'" - and I'm a Yankee! Amazing how country people talk the same no matter where they're from.

I have to confess, the first time I went out to dinner in TX, I ordered "chicken fried" and was surprised when I got steak! I'd heard of it before, but thought that it would have said "chicken fried steak" on the menu so thought I was getting fried chicken. My ILs had a good laugh (they needed it - we had been picking out a casket for FIL and went out afterwards), DH took pity on me and swapped meals. I don't even remember what he ordered.

palimpsest - I've got to brush up my high school Latin - I'd love to put something like that on my wall!

Gotta go take the quiz!
2ajsmama
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Well, I came out 44% Yankee. Changed one answer (I can go with pa-jahm-as, or pa-jam-as - I kept "tag sale" although I also call it yard sale many times, tag sale is what I grew up with). That one answer changed me to 51% Dixie. So I guess I really did come home from college an almost-Southerner (and I answered "you guys" instead of "y'all")!

Funny, I always figured "bubbler" was RI (where DS picked it up), but I never knew it was common in MA. I can't think of any now, but it seemed like there were a lot of RI-unique phrases/words when we lived there. The accent is somewhere b/t Boston and Long Island. I'm always telling DS people in CT are going to make fun of him if he doesn't learn to pronounce his words the way they do here.
palimpsest
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
50% Yankee which kinda makes sense. My father is from central PA and my mother was born in Philadelphia and moved to Virginia. She has one of the nicest nonaccented speaking voices I've ever heard. Now, I live close to the Mason Dixon line and have the worst of the whingeing, through the nose accent of Northwestern PA with some of the bad aspects of Southeastern PA thrown in. I cringe when I hear my own voice on tape.
littledog
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Sister, I scored 100% Dixie. It asked if I was related to General Lee.

I wonder whether it's that rural people pretty much speak the same all over, or if it's a natural effect of the miracle of modern media (television, radio, movies) that we have so generously shared our Dixie/Western (AKA to the rest of the world as Redneck/Hillbilly) culture?

Larapin' = good enough to lick the plate clean (but not in front of company)
THOR, Son of ODIN
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Littledog: I wonder whether it's that rural people pretty much speak the same all over...

I think you have a good point there.

We city-folk have to remind ourselves that our friends on the farm have dinner at noon, not in the evening.

It is too bad you cannot see urban/rural on the maps.

-Lena
hhireno
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
According to the quiz I am 48% Yankee & barely qualify as a Yankee. This is a little odd since I've never lived below the Mason Dixon line. Whatever....(a common term across the U.S. but primarily used by people much younger than my demographic). I think my result was skewed by the bug question since I've never heard of them so I had to randomly pick an answer.

Two other phrases commonly used by my pseudo-Yankee family, both due to my father's years in the military:
close enough for government work - not precise but will suffice
hurry up and wait - rush to be ready and then have to sit around waiting to leave
mary_p36
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Hi - Couldn't resist posting.
When I was little, my older brother used to tease me unmercifully, so I called him a basket -- because I'd get in trouble if I called him a b@st@rd, but basket got the point across. ;->

My daddy's family (yup, still call him daddy) pronounces the word "perfect" as "perfek", and they "worsh" instead of "wash".

Some phases,

Well, that's a fine how do you do! (that's annoying or bad)
Well, I'll be! (or I'll be darned or a monkey's uncle)
Can't beat it with a stick (meaning it's good)
Fine as frog's hair (it's good, or exceptionally good)
Like a chicken on a bug - or
Like white on rice (I'm on it or all over it)
Well, drop my jaw! (I'm suprised)

If you were sad, you were "down in the mouth"

This one I've only heard once, so it may not be common...
Well, butter my butt and call me a biscuit!

There's - he wouldn't bite a biscuit (tame animal)
Wouldn't hurt a fly (kind, gentle)

For a crying kid, there was, "I'll give you something to cry about!" Then you'd get a whippin' if you didn't stop cryin'. You might even have to go git a switch (small branch) that you'd be whipped with!

Oh, and "fixin to" means about to as was said earlier, but there's also "aimin' to" which means planning to (fixin' is immediate, aimin' is further in the future)

My grand mother had a duh-van' instead of a couch or sofa - I guess it's short for davenport, but she never said davenport. One of her favorite sayings was, "Of all the foolishness!", and she called my grand father "sweet'ert" instead of sweet heart. He called her "house fly", which I don't understand to this day. Must have been an inside joke. misbehaved children were ruffians or hooligans.

Oh, and my great-grand mother always served tea cakes. They are lightly sweet, plain vanilla cookies.

That's all I can think of now.
johnmari
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Two other phrases commonly used by my pseudo-Yankee family, both due to my father's years in the military:
close enough for government work - not precise but will suffice
hurry up and wait - rush to be ready and then have to sit around waiting to leave

My dad was a civilian employee of the Navy off and on for many, many years (he was not healthy enough to do military service, 4-F in the Vietnam draft). His favorite one from his time there was, in response to someone asking "why", "there doesn't have to BE a reason!" I get dirty looks from many people when I say "close enough for government work" though, I imagine they're probably government employees. :-)

This one I've only heard once, so it may not be common...
Well, butter my butt and call me a biscuit!

Paula Deen says this one all the time on her Food Network show "Paula's Party". :-)

Dad used the "I'll give you something to cry about" line in response to pointless sniveling, tantrums, or especially being "spleeny" (that's wailing over a minor scrape or bump like your leg's been cut off). Actually being hurt, sick, or genuinely terrified was something else entirely, although kids were still encouraged to "keep a stiff upper lip". We're from Maine so I think that one may well be universal. LOL
susie100
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
I was born in WV, as were my parents and GP's. Their parents came from Scotland, Ireland, Germany, England, as did most of the folks around us. My Dad pronounced "film" as "filum", "house" as "hoose". We always referred to soda as "tonic". When we moved from WV to Ohio, my mom sent my sister and I (ages 5 & 7) to the local confectionary to buy "tonic" and we came home with Brylcreem. My all time favorite from my Dad (I think he made this up): "I'm from WV, where the men are men and the women are double-breasted".
housewitch
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
My grand mother had a duh-van' instead of a couch or sofa - I guess it's short for davenport, but she never said davenport.

Rather than davenport, I think she probably just meant divan. A divan is a sofa-like piece of furniture, originally of Ottoman derivation. Southern ladies of a certain age still sometimes say divan rather than couch or sofa. ;-)
kitchenwitch
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
I'm from New Jersey -- when we go to the beach, we're going "down the shore". Purse, handbag & pocketbook are interchangeable, so is sofa and couch. We have lunch in the middle of the day, but my mother, who was raised by her Irish parents in NYC, called it "luncheon" -- even if it was a baloney sandwich in a paper bag. My father was from Akron, Ohio, and when we visited our relatives there, they all said "pop", "sack", and the evening meal was supper.

I wear flip-flops; my husband's family always called them "slaps". Italian subs are "hoagies". We get them and our pizza at a pizza place, not Dominos or Pizza Hut.

When two cars hit each other, we call it an "accident", but my friend from Texas calls it a "wreck", and the the tow truck is called a "wrecker". Much more descriptive, I think.

things my grandparents would say:

"idle hands are tools of the devil", "many hands make light work", and my favorite, "do as I say or I'll knock ya into tomorrow
groomingal
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
I'm in the south and here a few we use:

Pillow case is a Pillow slip
The utilities bill is the light bill
Kisses are Sugars
Toes are Piggies
Pants/Jeans are Britches

Hot outside- "It's hotter than a whore in church"
Cold out- "Colder than a well diggers a$$"

According to my grandma- men have "prostrates" Lymphnodes are "kernels" Rubbing alcohol is "Alkehol" and you "Wrench" your hair after you "Warsh" it.
mary_p36
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
"When two cars hit each other, we call it an "accident", but my friend from Texas calls it a "wreck"..."

I call it "custom body work", but that's just me. ;->
lesmis
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Oh, this is such a great thread, I just found it! I'm born and raised in southern Maryland but my mother was a Virginian and my father was from Michigan so we heard a little bit of everything growing up.

My father liked to say that it was colder than a well diggers as*

He also always answered the telephone "yellow" to which we would reply pink, purple, green!

My mother and grandmother would say "you can't make a silk purse out of a sows ear." Referring to anyone or anything that was trying to be something they were not.

They would also say "he was dumber than a stump" or "they were hit with an ugly stick" (they really were nice people I swear LOL)

My grandmother loved to go get a cone of cream, never ice cream

I call Peonies, "pe*own"ees" for years and my mother called Clematis "clem*at"tis

I say y'all and I used to warsh my clothes or go visit Warshington, but having married a midwestener I've lost the "r" a little.

My husband is from Indiana and he says "twoer" for tour...

Here in SOMD they say:
You wush for you wish

Dee by gawd captn which means they agreed completely

Dogs are pronounced doogs

The term "theys runnin good" refers to how the crabbing is that morning.

And "what do you think" is pronounced "what do you thingk" the "g" is a dead give away that you are from a certain part of southern Maryland.

Creeks are not tiny things you can jump across but huge bodies of water that you can water ski in.

The Chesapeake Bay is simply called the Bay and the rivers are just called the Potomac or the Patuxent, never the Potomac "River"

Kat :)
arleneb
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Nan, thanks SO much for starting this thread . . . it's been such fun to read. I remembered my grandparents and parents saying many of the things that have been mentioned: "Useless as t!ts on a boar . . ."

I grew up in Indiana, and we always had a roof (rhymes with hoof) over our heads, we warshed both bodies and clothes, and we loved Eye-talian food. When I hit college, I got rid of all three of those in the first week . . . DH still warshes, though. And now that I have an Italian son-in-law, I'm REALLY glad I learned to pronounce that!

We always had dinner at noon and supper in the evening.

One of our family's favorites stemmed from our annual hay-fever-season trip to Traverse City, Michigan and the Upper Peninsula. Before the bridge went in, ferry boats were the only way to get back and forth, and forever after, when we saw a clot of traffic, someone in the car would say, "I guess another boat came in!" -- as in ferry boat disgorging cars.

I taught in Georgia in the 60s, and learned all about red eye gravy, that y'all is plural, and that "Will you carry me to the grocery?" wasn't to be taken literally. Now that I live in Tennessee, I'm glad to know that!

Fun, fun thread!

Arlene
rob333 (zone 7b)
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Y'all have covered most of the ones I've heard since I moved to the South. I've lived in Maryland, Hawaii, California, and the South. My favorite southism is "fixin' to fax". When I first moved here, I would hear people say things like "My arrow your bow" which meant my "error" or "I am sorry". Everyone is called sir or ma'am. Doesn't matter what your age. You could be 10 and the person addressing you is 52, and he'd still call you ma'am. I sorta like that one, it's at least polite.

"Would you like a coke?" "Yes please" "Ok. Which kind? We have orange Crush, Sprite, Dr. Pepper, Coke..." Whattha f?!
Warsh (still can't handle hearing that one)
Carry you places (usually the grocery store)
Supper. I'd never heard supper until I moved here
The frigid-dare (I assume she was saying "Frigidaire") for the refrigerator
"Colder than a witches t-t in a brass bra". That's bone chillingly cold
The POLE-eece came when an am-bu-LANCE had "been to" the EYE-talian neigbor's house.

My grandmother used to make soup out of her leftovers (it was to die for, very yummy!) that, appparently, my wore my grandfather plum (or is it plumb?) out (bothered him greatly!) and which he called "slumgullion". Everything was slumgullion if it was a mixture type of concoction. It could be beef stroganoff served over rice or her soup, it didn't matter which it truly was. When it rained there were plenty of loblollies. Did you know that it meant mudholes? I didn't. These are real words in a dictionary that I'd never heard before or since. No one uses them in sentences. Ever.
sister_zen
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
what a fun thread! I think most of the stuff I've heard/used is already on the page, except one I love using. I heard this from a co-worker several years ago, and its become my one of my favorite things to say:

"That's a whole new sack of cats". meaning that's a complete different thing. similar to, "that's a whole 'nother ball game" (which would be an expression *I* grew up with). I love using it. It stops most people mid conversation and makes them say, "Huh?" hehe

One other comment from JohnMaris - you had that expression, "from away" on your page. My sister moved to Portland, Maine about 2 years ago. It drives her nuts that people still introduce her like this: "this is Debra...she's from away." LOL
pris
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
I'm familiar with almost all of these but have one my DIL says that I had never heard before. Mis Kell aneous (hard k). I really don't know if that's from her native East Texas (they do have their own dialect) or if she just read it that way years ago and has always mispronounced. (She is a blonde you know)
gin2402
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
I'm a language teacher so I absolutely love this thread, ya'll! (I'm from coastal SC) The thing that I think is most interesting linguistically about some parts of the South is the use of double modals. "might could" "maybe would" "might would", etc.

Now that my grandparents and parents have passed away it amuses me when I hear myself say something I grew up hearing them say. Some examples are:

"Goodness gracious" or "Gracious day" or "goodness gracious day" if you're really shocked.

or "well, I swany" (not sure how to spell that since don't believe it's actually a word!)

"aint you a sight for sore eyes" -good to see you

"older than dirt"

"hissy fit" - for tantrum

"tater rows"- dirty neck on a child

"pepsi and a nab"- a soda and a pack of crackers (like lance)

"who's your people?" - who are your parents/grandparents/etc.

Oh, and if it's raining while the suns shining that means "the devil is beating his wife"

and as a parting, "ya'll come to the house"
golddust
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Sorry. I've been too busy, running around like a chicken with my head cut off.
groomingal
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
gin2402- what you refer to as "tater rows" we call "granny beads"
housewitch
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
gin2402, here in SE Georgia, "who's your people" is more commonly expressed as "who you b'long to?" Once the answer to that's determined, well then next time we see you, we'll ask "how's ya mommanem?" ;-)
parma42
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
"Dumb as a box of rocks."

Funny phrase-not the OP. :)
allison0704
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
But my favorite has got to be the verb "tump." As in, "She was pushin' that buggy down the ramp and then the whole thing tumped over."

What's wrong with "tumped over?" ;D

Groomingal, what part of the south are you in? I've never heard some of those.

DD1 called the sofa "sosa" once. We've called it that ever since - not in public. Dances with Wolves came out and one of the kids said "Dance with Wussies" so that's stuck around with us too.

My maternal g'ma always said "yeller." Drove me nuts. I miss her. :( My mom says "Chicargo" which drives my DS crazy since he moved there for college and settled there afterwards.

I'm sure there's more, but the puppy needs to go tinkle. Oh, DH has one for it being too hot outside, but it's not forum friendly! lol
johnmari
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
"older than dirt" This one's common here in New England too. One of my elderly university professors used to say he was "oh, somewhere 'bout ninety years older than God". (I swear this man was held together with the tar from his pipe tobacco and pure stubbornness; he moved so much like a badly-strung marionette that you expected to hear him clank. He's a dear man who will always have a special place in my heart even though he flunked me more than once and kicked my rump up and down campus fairly regularly. LOL)

"hissy fit" - for tantrum Ditto, but also just plain "hissy". "Conniption" or "conniption fit" is just as common and I think perhaps one notch up on the "take cover" scale.
rob333 (zone 7b)
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
allison0704, groomingal must be from middle Tennessee because I've heard those my whole life, including the granny beads. I had a boss who once kiddingly described someone as older than mummy dust. I liked that one. I used "happier 'n a pig in slop" the other day and it fit exactly the feeling I was trying to get across, nothing else woulda fit the bill.
allison0704
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Thanks, rob333.

My favorite from a good friend when talking about someone close to her "Dirt don't die."
groomingal
14 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Rob333- holy cow, you are good! So yes Allison, I am from Middle Tennessee.

Funny phrases? Regional, Familial or invented

Comments (90)

Mimou-GWOriginal Author

Related Discussions

Mimou-GWOriginal Author

COMPANY

BUSINESS SERVICES

GET HELP

CONNECT WITH US

Mimou-GW
Original Author

Mimou-GW
Original Author