This entry was posted on Friday, February 9th, 2018 at 06:06 and is filed under Is this a great country, or what?.
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3 Responses to “Talk Like a Texan: How Texans Use “Down,” “Out,” “Over,” and “Up””
I have a few friends that grew up in “Deep East Texas” and I swear sometimes I need a translator. One was frustrated trying to order breakfast in North Dakota when the waitress couldn’t understand “surl” (cereal). You’d think she was from one of those little Yankee states like “Massatoossus”. I had a long discussion with an electrician, trying to convince him we needed to re-write a safety report about a fire in a “pecker-head” (electrical junction).
I had to laugh when a Yankee friend was upset because she found herself using the term, “fixin'” and that it made sense. She was worried what her friends back home would think if she accidentally said, “I was just fixin’ to go to the store.”
My FIL spent a few years working in Louisiana and frequently needed translation for Cajun/English terms, like “hose-pipe” (garden hose). Parts of New Orleans have an accent that sounds exactly like New York City. A cab driver told me that when he was in the navy people would ask about places to visit in NYC and looked shocked when he told them he’d never been there.
Then again, I spent a few miserable years in NY and could not help but correct people when they pronounced, “pecan” as “pee-can”. Out on the farm, a pee-can was something you kept under the bed so you din’t have to go all the way to the outhouse at night. In Texas, when you say, “New York”, you are referring to New York City. In NY, you would be referring to the state.
February 9th, 2018 at 11:06
And “Tom” (my name) is “Towm” and sometimes “Towum”.
February 9th, 2018 at 15:45
And it’s surprising how many Texans think ‘of’ is pronounced ‘off’.
February 10th, 2018 at 00:36
I have a few friends that grew up in “Deep East Texas” and I swear sometimes I need a translator. One was frustrated trying to order breakfast in North Dakota when the waitress couldn’t understand “surl” (cereal). You’d think she was from one of those little Yankee states like “Massatoossus”. I had a long discussion with an electrician, trying to convince him we needed to re-write a safety report about a fire in a “pecker-head” (electrical junction).
I had to laugh when a Yankee friend was upset because she found herself using the term, “fixin'” and that it made sense. She was worried what her friends back home would think if she accidentally said, “I was just fixin’ to go to the store.”
My FIL spent a few years working in Louisiana and frequently needed translation for Cajun/English terms, like “hose-pipe” (garden hose). Parts of New Orleans have an accent that sounds exactly like New York City. A cab driver told me that when he was in the navy people would ask about places to visit in NYC and looked shocked when he told them he’d never been there.
Then again, I spent a few miserable years in NY and could not help but correct people when they pronounced, “pecan” as “pee-can”. Out on the farm, a pee-can was something you kept under the bed so you din’t have to go all the way to the outhouse at night. In Texas, when you say, “New York”, you are referring to New York City. In NY, you would be referring to the state.