Bill and I have been together for 32 years. Every single day he makes me laugh.
Today I was taking a shower when he opened the bathroom door and asked, "Are you saving tooters?"
"Tooters? Taters?"
"Tooters!"
I don't know what you're talking about. I'll be out in a minute."
"Are you saving DIRTERS?" he shouted.
"Oh! Yes, for the boys. Save all the dirters you can."
When their mama was two, we used to babysit her often. She begged us for our dirter. We had no idea what she wanted. She cried and cried. We asked her to show us.
Ashley went to the pantry, rummaged through the trash can, pulled out an empty paper towel tube, put it to her mouth, and pretended it was a horn, "Dirter dir-dir-dir-dirt-dir-dirt! A dirter, see?"
Yes, Bill, save the dirters and tooters.
We had friends visiting from Boston once, and when they heard my daughter tell Ashley to go WARSH her hands, they couldnt believe it. They omitted their "R's and St. Louisans added them.
For the record, after I showered and WASHED, I hooked five tooters together. Won't Alex and Charlie be excited? I suspect they'll call them light sabers.
Any unusual vernacular in your neck of the woods?
4 comments:
Being a military child, I was subjected to various styles of language. That being said, I was raised mostly in the deep south and have entertained many people up north with my southern accent and simply repeating things said to me in my childhood. I can hear my favorite aunt's voice telling e and my cousins to "get on outta the tub now and get your step-ins on". We always got a buggy upon entering the grocery store to collect our purchases. That was fine in Georgia and Florida that worked out fine, but when we moved to Minnesota and asked where the buggies were, we were met with blank looks. Carts, they are carts ... While the northerners ay think us to be less than well educated, they have their own ways. The first time someone asked me if I would borrow them some money, I replied, "No, but I might be willing to LOAN you some money." And, as I was quick to point out to the same person "boughten" is NOT the past tense of bought!
Oh my gosh! My students called a calculator a cockulator. I thought they were trying to put one over on me, but it was rampant throughout the school. From 6th grade to 12th (the range of my students), that's how they said it. Even one of my own boys picked up that pronunciation, in elementary!
These kids also referred to the visitation at a funeral home as The Lay-Out. I overheard a couple of girls talking about going to the lay-out after school, and thought they were making plans for sunbathing!
Nobody talked like that when I was growing up around here! One of the weird words my mom used was "conly." It meant "kind of." As in, "I'm feeling conly tired, so I'm going to bed early tonight."
English is not my native language, but I'm learning all kinds of words that are considered local, odd, funny. I had a blog follower (he stopped blogging after a while) whose posts I had to read more than once to understand, and to be able to leave a comment. They were sprinkled with words and expressions that were a mixture of spanish and english (the guy was of mexican descent). It was quite an experience!
That's a cute story, Linda. I was wondering what the 'tooters' were, so glad you let us know at the end. ; )
That's funny about your friends from Boston. Isn't it interesting how we all talk? I was told one time that it sounds like I have a twang accent. And they say Californians have their own distinct way of talking. I didn't realize that. : )
~Sheri
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