October 30, 2003

You Say Tomato

I've seen the "soda vs. pop (and those weirdo's who say "tonic")" survey before but Natalie over at Pickle Juice points us to a new survey that she found via Swirlspice. Don't miss her hilarious take on Minnesotanese.

Check out The Dialect Survey

As Arte Johnson would say "Verrrry Interesting...."

I always called cold cut sandwiches Grinders, but it seems that's a very east coast thing. Also - no questions about pasties? C'mon! And it's pronounced past-y not paste-y.

Posted by MJ at October 30, 2003 06:44 PM
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I was too tired to read through all of that survey but it was quite interesting. I learned I'm lacking in the vocabulary department.

I've never heard the words: hosey, bubbler, slue-footed, harvestman, peenie wallie, or several others.

Nor have I ever heard the phrases: the wolf is giving birth, the devil is beating his wife, monkey's wedding, fox's wedding, pineapple rain, liquid sun, and/or whipping shitties.

Posted by: Mopsie at October 30, 2003 07:37 PM

They ought break out the demos by class too; I think that influences pronunciation at least as much as geography.

To their list I would offer my two more:

Using the singular contraction of "to be" with plural nouns. To wit: "There's millions of people who have evidently forgotten the word 'are'!"

and ...

MIRROR

(Hey, maybe you should do that one!)

Posted by: The Missus at October 30, 2003 09:48 PM

MJ - the entire free world calls them subs..you know, like the SUBway fast food chain. A grinder is more of a warm sandwich or something other than a lunchmeaty kind of thing. Like a meatball grinder. Regarding pasties, I think that is a Michigan thing. Maybe a bit in Minnesota, but in any event it isn't worth wasting your breath to describe what a delicious treat they are to people who only see a pile of meat inside of crust. They'll eat freakin' pot-pies until the cows come home, but heaven forbid you take it out of the little metal tin and cook it. DELICIOUS!!!

Posted by: MJS at October 31, 2003 07:08 AM

Question #80: What do you call it when the rain falls while the sun is shining?

Answer: "Morning in the Mission"

Posted by: Cyndi at October 31, 2003 08:36 AM

Honey, don't get all worked up about it. There's lots of ways to say mirror and mayonaise.

Aw, Cyndi now you got me all nostalgic. I miss our harmonies. ::sigh::

Posted by: MJ at October 31, 2003 09:03 AM

all right. coming from the part of the country where accents are beyond belief, i have a opinion.
surprise. they are subs. and why is tonic any weirder than pop? please. let's not be regional-phobic. no-no. i mean, a bag is a bag, not a sack. and what's free about the freeway? it's an expressway. and dude is unacceptable. oh, the torture. anyhow, trick or treat. i'm going out for mexican. which, by the way is what is called everywhere. gotta love it

Posted by: uh-oh, him at October 31, 2003 02:39 PM