If we're singing praises, then I do believe I could sit and repeat the word "arroyo" to myself over and over, and never get tired of doing so.

I’m tired of “space”. It’s a lovely room works just as well.

Bbstx, Re the ‘p’ word...My DD and I use ‘step-ins’ and that is sort of an inside joke. It is thanks to a long-deceased southern comedian who called them that in a book of funny stories and routines.

@OutsidePlaying, my aunt, who was always rather droll, also called them “step-ins.” I think it is a term we need to bring back! Thanks for the memory.

@User, I’m curious, what do you call them? Drawers? Bloomers? When you go into Victoria’s Secret, what do you ask for?

@bunny I made it up. Think about how you say a list of items, with the emphasis on each of several words, then do that in a non-list sentence. Drives me to drink, I tell you.

There is a guy on Youtube whose channel is called "Pronouncing Things Incorrectly". He is hilarious!

The comedian was Lewis Grizzard. He wrote a column for the (then) Atlanta Joirnal-Constitution which was also published in our local paper. I was hooked. He had several books published, his first being ‘They Tore out my Heart and Stomped that Sucker Flat’ about his heart valve replacement, about his heart surgery and valve replacement with a pig valve. It was a congenital problem which eventually led to his early death. A couple of the books are collections of his articles. Very funny if you need some southern humor to brighten your day. I should re-read, as I have them all and saw him live 3 times.

They are underwear. Nice gender neutral term. Plus it doesn't give me the screaming heebie-jeebies, so it's a nice added bonus for me. Ha.

I just call them 'underwear' too.

Underpants works too.

Outsideplaying, on a Designing Women episode, Anthony, the big guy who did the deliveries and furniture moving for them, was telling the women what he’d done the night before: “washing out some dainties”.

bpath, "that’s what the double-n does, changes the vowel. (And yes, isn’t is funny that that doesn’t happen with the word “phonics”!)". haha. That is because the vowel sound is usually (of course, there are exceptions that need to be taught) determined by the type of syllable: open, closed, or vowel-consonant-e.

Now, the teacher will retire...again. ;-)

Oh and I thought of another word I dislike thanks to my parents. Pants used in place of trousers or slacks. I tend to use trousers (yes, I am THAT old and grew up with people who wouldn't dream of calling them pants which referred to underwear), but I don't use slacks very often (no 't' sound there please). I do use pants now, but it is a word of which I am always exceptionally aware. Notice how I avoided ending with a preposition there?

Springroz, is it like:

I. Hate. It. When. People. Do. This.

@runninginplace- This is from usingenglish.com- "You can say that ferry is pronounced like very , merry and berry with a short (e) while fairy is pronounced like fair , air , pair after adding the (y) so you can notice that it is pronounced a long a.

I pronounce ferry, very, merry. sherry, berry, fairy, airy, and hairy the same, i.e., they rhyme.

I pronounce ferry, very, merry. sherry, berry, fairy, airy, and hairy the same, i.e., they rhyme.

Me too. I don't know anyone who pronounces air, fair, and hair with a long a.

This Gramarist website says The words fairy and ferry are pronounced the same way but are spelled differently and have two very different meanings.

You can listen to the pronunciation of fairy here

I'm going to reiterate that fairy and ferry (or merry) are pronounced the same when I say them and appreciate I'm not the only one with that pattern. I actually tried to find somewhere online to hear the two words pronounced differently but couldn't.

Outsideplaying Lewis Grizzard was a treasure! I loved reading his gentle humor and yes he was absolutely quintessentially Southern. I read Rick Bragg's pieces in Southern Living and have enjoyed his books but he's definitely not a gentle humorist.

Oh, Bpath, I loved Designing Women, and Anthony just made the show! Love that term. We usually just say undies or underwear, which I also think is a good generic term without being specific.

Running, I agree with you about Rick Bragg. I love reading his work, but he is not gentle.

Oh yes - almost forgot about undies! Wonder why that doesn't bother me like 'panties' does?

And I say 'pj's for pajamas - totally confused my granddaughters.

Personally, I like to call them underoos. They're NOT (because these are underoos), but it's still silly enough to get me to say it when that article of clothing enters a discussion.

1) I cannot make ferry and fairy sound like different words 🤷🏼‍♀️

2) My family calls underwear skivvies but I don’t know why. According to Merriam-Webster app, first know use was 1919 and it was a trademark. 🤷🏼‍♀️

Merry mary marry hairy harry.

Mary marry merry hairy harry.

With punctuation and caps:

Merry Mary, marry hairy Harry.

Mary, marry merry hairy Harry.

It's subtle, but to me it is "fehree" and "fairee."

Some pronunciations are regional, obviously, IMO, as long as people are spelling them the same, pronunciation isn't too big an issue - but that said, I do not care for 'Feb-you-ary', 'ree-lah-tor', and 'physical' in place of 'fiscal'.

I was taught that spoken language is informal, while most rules are for written language.

My BIL from OK tells the story of when his elementary school teacher totally confounded him by asking him to spell George WARshington 😆

And my dad, born & raised in NY by 2 ex Londoners, always said 'soar' instead of 'saw'...

Marry and merry/Mary don't sound the same.

I notice East coasters pronounce Sarah, Karen, and Sharon with a different first "a" sound than West coasters. Sarah rhymes with terra. Or Yogi Berra.

I almost used the phrase "reaching out" today but remembering this thread stopped me in my tracks and I used alternate phrasing.

lol blfenton, I caught myself writing "paint it out" on a thread and then deleted the out.

I haven't heard "paint it out," except when referring to painting over graffiti or a bad wall color. Is there another meaning? It's not a construction that I would use.

terriks, me either. Never heard of it before. I'd probably say, "get rid of it."

I first heard "paint it out" on HGTV (Property Brothers are repeat offenders), whenever someone referred to painting over anything. Just say "paint it."

In Upstate NY, the dividing line is how to pronounce Syracuse —“Sara-cause” vs Sear-acuse “. I’m in the second camp.

I happened to notice "paint it out" because someone upthread says it bugs her. I don't know that I've used it too much and it doesn't really bother me, but it does seem unnecessary when paint it works fine.

I looked back at my posts yesterday to see if I could find where I was tempted to use "paint it out" and it was on a curb appeal thread. I wrote: "I'd paint that wire the same color as the siding so it disappears." I think I originally wrote "paint out that wire."

Back to the original post - I remember a comedian who was telling a joke about a long distance company that had advertised, "Reach out and touch someone." The comedian was complaining about the long distance bill and said, "I must have reached out and touched too many people." That's the main reference I have for this term, although I've heard "reach out" on British TV recently more often than American TV.

One thing that bothers me is when people say "is is," as in "The point is is that..." The second "is" does not need to be there. I'm sure people do not write this way, but I hear them saying it a lot, mostly on American shows made in the Northeast, and so it may be a regional thing. I do think that most of the language quirks in the NE originally come from England, however.

Some of these are completely new to me: virtue signaling, speaking truth to power, here's my ask, fell pregnant, wheelhouse, scaffolding, unpack, here for it, canned culture, paint it out. How have I managed to miss them? Lucky I guess.

I double space after periods. DD "reaches out to her brothers" but I'm happy that they stay in touch. DH is a grammarian and often points out errors on the evening news or in the newspaper.

Saying something 'needs washed' or the 'lawn needs mowed' is a regionalism common to Central PA as Funky said. It was also common in Pittsburgh where several linguists have written that it came with the Scots-Irish since it's also heard in the south of Scotland and Ulster. My grandmother used to say 'it's time to redd up your room' which is another Scots' dialect word meaning to clean or tidy up and is heard in western PA and Ohio.

There are a number of Scots-Irish words that I remember :

neb or nebby meaning to pry into someone else's business.

slippy - for slippery

yinz - second person plural derived from 'you ones'

jag - to poke

jaggerbush - a bush with thorns

Can't believe I forgot to mention a big pet peeve of mine, and that is when people begin a sentence with "I mean." Apropos of nothing, they start a statement with "I mean." "I mean, we had chicken last week so should have fish today." I'm hearing this oddity more and more. Why?

Ida, I often start off with either "I mean" or "So." It's just another form of "Well" or [clears throat to speak]. It makes no sense, but it's an easy habit in which to fall.

I know. I've actually caught myself a time or two starting to say it, because I've just heard it so often. I think it's good to be aware of these odd patterns of speech that we all tend to adopt in some form, but in normal conversation, it's rarely a simple thing to rein it all in. I tend to be more annoyed with certain of these peculiarities when hearing them on TV, as when news anchors are bantering back and forth.

I even write informally using "I mean" and "So."

I have a friend who ends most sentences with, "Know what I mean". I have spent more time than usual with her last month and found myself starting to say the same thing. NOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!! I am listening to myself very carefully and ending this habit before it becomes ingrained.

Saw a good one today: low in behold rather than lo and behold!

I think many Pennsylvania sayings come from German. Most of the Pennsylvania Settlers came from Germany. Another one to add to Marie Cate’s list is Outen the light.

"I even write informally using "I mean" and "So."

And that's because we feel the need for a little introductory phrase, especially at the beginning of a conversation/email. IMO this is a natural part of communication. Most languages have these intro-words. I don't see any reason to avoid them!

Sable

That's a good one dedtired - I'd forgotten all about that one. When I was young we lived next door to a family that had moved from York, PA and their grandmother used to say 'outen the light' and when the kids came home from school she'd give them 'butterbread' which is from the German Butterbrot.

I also am sooooo tired of "journey" as in whatever perfectly normal life phase one is experiencing. Everybody is on a journey with their spouse or through parenthood. Just this morning on FB someone complimented a sibling for their journey as a foster parent.

Enough already, quit talking about it just go fill your water bottle, top off the tank and get moving on that little journey of yours!

Speaking of journeys, I know someone who frequently claims that she's "on the struggle bus." Ugh.

^^^ that's hilarious! 🤣 🤣 🤣

Had to reach out to you with this . I was reading the reviews on the Orvis site and here is their response to one comment:

“Thank you for your review. We are sorry for any inconvenience caused by the quality of this cardigan and will be happy to pass your feedback along to our Product Developers for review moving forward. This cardigan is covered by our Great Catch Guarantee! You can reach out to us by phone, e-mail, or chat and we will be happy to assist you.”

They could have simply said “ you can reach us by phone etc”. Also, “moving forward” is annoying. The sentence could have ended after the words “for review“. I’d love to know the age of the person who wrote that response.

Maire Cate, my relatives said butterbread! I have many German ancestors.

She shed and man cave.

Dedtired, overwriting like that is irritating. It's supposed to make us think the company is polite and concerned, but it's just annoying bs.

The same with overwriting news stories, burying the lead in the fifth paragraph. No wonder people don't read newspapers the way they did. Get to the point succinctly.

I also dislike people who begin almost every sentence with "So..." To do it occasionally is okay, but not every sentence. Equally annoying (as mentioned above) is when people interject "right?" frequently into a sentence. It makes them sound like they constantly need approval and are unsure of themselves. It is especially bad when newscasters do this, as it undermines their credibility.

I do not like when people ask a question (which they do not allow anyone else to answer) and then answer it themselves, as if they are interviewing themselves and the person they are talking to cannot ask the question. These people have an excessive need (or desire) to control conversations and do not like to listen to others.

Another annoyance is when people answer a question with "That's a great question," before they answer the question. Again, it is okay to do it once or maybe twice, but when it becomes habitual, it loses all meaning. It just sounds like they are stalling for time before they give an answer.

I read an online article recently and encountered a new (new to me at least) use of the word 'bandwidth.' The article offers ideas for setting boundaries at work and they suggested this response when you're asked to do something beyond your purview:

........."Say something like, I don’t have the bandwidth to do a good job on this right now and give you the help/attention this deserves."................

If someone said that to me and they weren't working on transferring data I think I'd offer to adjust their frequency.

https://monday.com/blog/productivity/how-to-nicely-say-that-is-not-my-job-and-create-better-boundaries-at-work/?utm_source=mb&utm_campaign=pocketlp

Maire