Ya'llbonics

[Perry]

I do tire of every Hollywood portrayal of a redneck/hick having a southern accent...or every tornado victim being soutern and with one tooth. (We heerd it a'comin'...sounded lak a big ol' freight train! Me and momma got inna tub and rode 'er out!)
No, wait. That one's true...

There was a wonderful dig at this stereotype in a TV spot for a Garmin PDA/handheld GPS navigator. A city couple finds themselves very lost on a back road. The wife says, "Honey, why don't you ask directions?". The husband gets out and approaches a mountain man sitting on his front porch, whittling.

"You ain't from around here are you?", inquires the mountain man.
"Can you tell me how to get back on interstate ___ (don't remember the number)?"

The mountain man stabs his knife into a log stump that is next to him and stands up (as the husband starts to get really nervous). In the next shot we see the mountain man with a Garmin handhled in his palm.

"You want me to print it out, or would you prefer to get it off the screen?"

[Huny]

Ok, Perry, now you did it. Now all the world knows I'm an "us'n". Get this. Today I called what I thought to be a local cable company to make some changes to my service. The lady I spoke with was obviously a northerner. Anyway, we were chatting away nicely until she asked me to verify my name. So I told her and she said, "Do you spell that---(insert some off-the-wall name I couldn't understand)? I said, "No, it's --- but it really is a hard name to remember and spell for some odd reason, so don't feel bad." Then she told me she got it wrong because she always has a hard time understanding customers who call from the south. I could not believe my ears! This is the first time anyone has ever said anything like that to me since I have lived here. I had her on speaker phone, so my husband heard the whole thing. His face lit up like it was christmas, he started doing this dance around the kitchen that I can only assume comes from years of living on the edge on nowhere, and started chanting, " Yeah, my wife is finally a true southerner!!" I told him if he didn't stop that mess right then I was going to light all his clothes on fire and then get some spray paint and graffiti his pickup truck to show him just how much California was still left in me. MAN!!

Huny- who-is-seriously-considering-going-to-satellite.

[Bailey]

Huny, I admire the woman's courage, I just get so steamed at all the out-sourced companies that hire folks who don't speaka de Engliss nor understand it aparently, I ask them to speak up because I have trouble hearing on the phone, but truely it's the dadburn accents, I can't get my ears around them.

[aside] I only watch American-made movies set in England or Australia because the homegrown palaver is too rich with fast-spoken slang and ad to the mix...the accent and I'm "LOST"
[/aside]

mark just-write-me-a-letter-please Bailey

[sluggo]

uh, what about us [very nice] Northerners?

Yeah, and us half-breeds? (or in the modern term, hybrids (hmm, maybe that one belongs up in the Wurds of the Year thread))

While "up north" on business about 10 years ago, this was said to me..."You're from the south? You must know a lot of ignorant people!"

Another good response: "Yeah, I'm meeting new ones all the time."

Less direct, but one that always got under my skin while in California was the term "back East". Comes off as "back there, the place we left- we'll never go there again".

[Huny]

Yeah, and us half-breeds? (or in the modern term, hybrids (hmm, maybe that one belongs up in the Wurds of the Year thread))

While "up north" on business about 10 years ago, this was said to me..."You're from the south? You must know a lot of ignorant people!"

Another good response: "Yeah, I'm meeting new ones all the time."

Less direct, but one that always got under my skin while in California was the term "back East". Comes off as "back there, the place we left- we'll never go there again".

I, too, am a half breed. But when in Rome...(There happens to be a nice little city here in Georgia call Rome) Also, when my east coast grandparents moved to California (out west), they alway refered to home as "back east" and here, In Georgia, they refer to California as "out west". I usually try to be more p.c. and say "right coast and left coast" It does sound like we are chalking our country to be nothing but a land that is somewhere "out-back" on earth if you look at it that way.

[Bailey]

On the west coast it's always "back east" or "out west" if you are from the east coast. Just like if you are in some states they say "up north", or "upstate" nothing rude or derogatory about it.
I'm not trying to hurt anyone's feelings, but I had a very weird neighbor in Georgia several in other states too,, all the crazies are NOT in California.
Don't get me wrong, I left nothing in California,
I have no reason to go back there. But to generalize about any part of our country is to devalue them, and they us when they do it.

mark just-had-to-have-have-my-say Bailey

[sluggo]

....I usually try to be more p.c. and say "right coast and left coast"

Don't look now but I think that could be deemed insensitive to Subterranean-Americans.

[Bailey]

Subterranean-Americans.

I think they are fewer than one part per million, they can just speak for themselves.

mark from-the ridiculous-to-the-ridiculouser Bailey