A dear friend and fellow North Caronlinian sent this to my family. As a North Carolinian, these are things I miss about my home state.
THINGS I LEARNED IN NORTH CAROLINA
1) A possum is a flat animal that sleeps in the middle of the road.
2) There are 5,000 types of snakes and 4,998 of them live in NC.
3) There are 10,000 types of spiders, and all 10,000 of them live in NC.
4) If it grows, it'll stick ya. If it crawls, it'll bite cha.
5) "Onced" and "Twiced" are words.
6) It is not a shopping cart, it's a buggy.
7) "Jaw-P?" means, "Did y'all go to the bathroom?"
8) People actually grow and eat okra. (Although, the best fried okra I've ever had was in Birmingham, AL with Harry Reeder and some of the saints at Briarwood Presbyterian!)
9) "Fixinto" is one word. (Now, there is a regional variant of this word. If you're from my neck of the woods, it's "finto." No need to bother with the 'x'. It means I'm about to do something.)
10) There is no such thing as lunch. There is only dinner and then there is supper... (Actually, there is lunch. Extra credit: which word is used for lunch, dinner or supper?)
11) Iced tea is appropriate for all meals, and you start drinking it when you're two. (Now my mama's iced tea is the best in the world! People come from all over the city to get a glass. For real)
12) Backwards and forwards means, "I know everythin' about you."
13) The word "jeet" is actually a phrase meaning, "Did you eat?"
14) You don't have to wear a watch, because it doesn't matter what time it is. You work until you're done or it's too dark to see.
15) You don't PUSH buttons, you MASH em.
16) You measure distance in minutes.
17) You switch from heat to A/C in the same day. (We've been known to ride around time with the heat on and the windows down to get the temperature in the car just right)
18) You know what a "Dawg" is. (There are two varieties--four-legged and two-legged)
19) You only own five spices: salt, pepper, Texas Pete, Tabasco and ketchup.
20) You find 100 degrees only "a bit warm." (That's because North Carolinians are born with gills. You need them to breathe in the humidity during the summer!)
21) Going "off to Wally World" is a favorite past time.
22) We don't need no dang Driver's Ed. If our mama says we can drive, we can drive, dag-nabbit.
23) You understand these jokes and forward them to your NC friends and those who just wish they were from North Carolina !!!!!
When I was a boy, there was actually a public ad campaign called "I like calling N.C. home." And we learned to dag-nabbit. I guess it's the southern, polite equivalent to "Don't mess with Texas," without all the cowboy macho stuff. Or it could just be a little insecurity about being "from the country" or the south. I didn't feel insecure about that, though. I identify with that commercial where the cowboys cry out incredulously, "New York City!" Can anything good come out of Gotham?
But I do like calling N.C. home, after heaven and Grand Cayman. We're sojourning, and picking up a few cultural laughs along the way. But hasten the day Lord!
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14 comments:
As one born and raised in NC, I understood all of these. :-)
It has taken me 2 and 1/2 years, but I think I've got all these down now.
Having a glass of sweet tea right now. 'Bout to eat my dinner.
I'm from Arkansas, yet these sound all to familiar to me as well. Well, I gotta go. I'm fixin to do some paperwork...
I was born in Greenville, NC, but raised in Goldsboro, NC. These are absolutely hilarious. To this day, my mom still corrects me if I call dinner lunch.
The only thing I would add is collards. I'm not sure if anyone outside of NC likes or even knows about collards.
I too have written about NC a bit on our church blog. Check it out if you have the time: http://cbcvirginia.blogspot.com/search/label/Adventures%20in%20Pikeville
Thanks,
Stacy Potts
I'm from SC, about 30 minutes from the NC line, and I understood all of them, too...and loved them! Thanks for the laugh.
How can we "git" some of that sweet tea?
I thought numbers 7 and 13 were the best!
I was born and raised in the Chicago suburbs but I, too, understood this list. And, I know that "dinner" means "lunch". And, I know about all the "Green brothers", too: Collard, Mustard and Turnip. And I grew up eating okra grown in someone's garden. Thankfully, I don't know much about snakes!
But, I should also mention that, back in the day, just about all the Black people in my hometown who were born before 1940 were born and raised in the South, with a large contingent from Alabama and Mississippi. And it seemed that most of those from Alabama were from the same town--Florence--which is where my folks were from.
For the most part, they migrated to Chicagoland in the 1920s & 30s (the Depression) or in the 40s, right after "The War" (WWII). They migrated North but were still Southerners at heart.
Wyeth,
Everybody either wants to be a southerner or they have "ruuts" in the south :-)
Wes, just drop by Mrs. Frances' house. She'll be sittin' out on the porch watching the cars go by!
T
Brother Bassam just smoked ya mate...get a life looser...accept ISLAM the true religion n ya will be saved...reject it an ya will perish..."Say truth have arrived and falsehood have perished for verily falsehood by its own nature is bound to perish" AL QURAN(17-81)
Don't forget your "pack of nabs", Krispy Kreme and Cheerwine!
I made the move from NC to Chicago and then from Chicago to TN. Sadly, I've added even more through being in the Volunteer State, which happens to have the most annoying team colors.
Dreaming of Carolina blue,
thanks for your post.
Hubby and I spent a year in KY on sabbatical at Southern Baptist - and I understood them all!
Even up here in Canada we have problems with lunch, dinner and supper. Lunch is a light meal served at noon, supper is a light meal served in the evening. Dinner is full meal served either at noon or at supper. Everybody still mixes them up all the time, arghhhh!
Loved your list!
I'm actually from Spartanburg, SC, but my wife is from Western NC and I'd say all of that stuff is true for both NC and SC... but now I live in Northern Manitoba and these Canadians wouldn't understand this stuff any better than a pig speaking chinese. We try to explain things about our culture to them, but only the ones who have been there can understand it...
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