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Some of these terms are VERY familiar to me, such as cellar, parlor and banging a u-euey. Others though are completed foreign -- Jimmies??? I'm a NY-er at heart, so there is some regional lingo here that I'm totally not familiar with. What do native nutmeggers think of this list? More MA/RI-type speech, or can you relate to this?...
I have lived in Connecticut my whole life and never heard many of these. The list of things:
1. "Jeezum Crow"
I've never heard anyone say Jeezum Crow in my life.
2. "We measure distance in time."
Well, yeah, if someone is driving you tell them how long it will take to get there. Duh.
3. "Jimmies"
This apparently is what some people call sprinkles. While I have heard of it, I have never heard anyone use the term.
4. "Wicked"
I say this one, but it is most common near Boston.
5. "Idear"
I once had a college professor who was from Rhode Island and added R's to the end of words. Only person I have ever heard do that.
6. "Suppah"
That's just a Boston accent.
7. "Bang a uey"
I've never heard anyone refer to a U-turn this way.
8. "Bubbler"
Never, ever. A water fountain is a water fountain. The bubbler is the thing in the swimming pool wall.
9. "Kitty corner"
Everyone everywhere doesn't use this term?
10. "Door yard"
I have never heard of this expression in place of driveway.
11. "Fluffernutter sandwich"
I've never had one because they sound nasty, but I thought kids everywhere liked them.
12. "Cellar"
I have heard cellar, but everyone calls it a basement when talking.
13. "Parlor"
Except in the board game Clue no one refers to a parlor.
14. "Soda" or "Tonic"
Everyone calls it soda. Never heard anyone call it tonic unless they want a gin and tonic. Pop is what midwesterners call it. I think soda is more universal.
15. Regular coffee means "cream and two sugars"
Don't drink coffee, have no idea.
16. "Quarter of" for the time...
I use this interchangeably with "quarter to" and had no idea it was different than anywhere else.
17. "Dungarees"
I have never heard jeans referred to as dungarees outside of an advertisement.
18. "Pocket book"
I hear this all the time, never realized it was considered regional.
19. "Draw"
No one I know mispronounces "drawer" this way.
20. "Huck"
Used in place of "throw" or "chuck" - I thought only kids said this.
21. "Frappe"
Only place I ever heard "frappe" is at McDonald's - didn't realize it wasn't nationwide.
22. "Down the road"
WTF else would you say if something IS down the road?
23. "Rotary"
I call them traffic circles, but I've heard the term rotary.
24. "Tractor trailer"
I always thought this is what they were properly called. It says used in place of "semi." I've heard "semi" but never quite understood it.
25. "Lollipop"
Seriously, they are called "suckers" outside New England? I don't believe that. They are lollipops everywhere, no? I've heard "sucker" but thought it was a hillbilly term.
26. "Jeet yet"
More mispronunciation that I have never heard.
27. "Hoodsie cup"
It doesn't say what other people call them, but I thought they were always Hoodsie cups.
28. "I'm all set"
Another one that I didn't think was regional. Isn't this used everywhere to mean the same as "no thank you"?
29. "Bureau"
I thought this was more what old people called "dressers" than anything regional, a generational gap.
30. "Supermarket"
I wouldn't say this is used in place of grocery store. A supermarket is bigger. A grocery store is more of a bodega-type place.
31. "Frost heaves"
I know this used to be the name of a minor league basketball team from Vermont, but I've never heard it outside of that.
32. "Hots"
I've never heard hot peppers referred to in this way. I hear them generically called "jalapenos" even though not all are.
33. "Elastic"
I thought this and "rubber band" were used everywhere as synonyms.
34. "Statie"
Again, I thought this was used everywhere to mean "state trooper".
35. "Triple deckah"
Mispronunciation aside, I only hear these called "three family homes".
36. "Butts"
I believe this only refers to the end of a cigarette not the whole thing as implied by the article.
37. "Clickah"
Yeah, it's pronounced "clicker" unless there's a Boston accent - quite a few of these are just accents, not different words.
38. "Packy"
I've only heard this in the New London area when referring to a package store, nowhere else in the state.
39. "Rubbish"
Only people I have ever heard call garbage "rubbish" are people from England, not New England.
That's it. I don't know if many of these are just inaccurate in that they are only used in Northern New England or what, but I have never heard many. Many others I have always believed are used everywhere across the US.
2. "We measure distance in time." I've never heard of this as any kind of common trend, but it makes sense since most people aren't really looking for actual distance, but rather how long it takes to get from point A to point B.
3. "Jimmies" The chocolate ones were called jimmies. Colored ones were sprinkles. And the fun-shaped ones like flat dots and stars were called shots.
4. "Wicked" This isn't even really Bostonian, as much as it is northeastern MA (such as Marblehead and Salem).
5. "Idear" This is not Connecticut at all, but it is definitely Rhode Island and eastern MA.
6. "Suppah" That's all Boston.
7. "Bang a uey" We used to say hang a U-ey...like, hang a left, hang a right, hang a u-ey. Never bang though.
8. "Bubbler" It's bubblah - and it's Boston.
9. "Kitty corner" I never knew it wasn't called that everywhere, til I left CT and heard catty-corner, caddy-corner, cat-a-corner, and the more correct "diagonal."
10. "Door yard" Never heard of this.
11. "Fluffernutter sandwich" That was a national commercial wasn't it? The Fluff commercial telling how to make a fluffernutter sandwich with fluff and peanutbutter? I always thought it was nationally known.
12. "Cellar" This one's interesting with my family. Cellar was what we called the lower level IF we were going through the Bilco door. Basement is what we called it when descending from inside the first floor of the house down the staircase. Also, if it's finished, with an actual room with walls and heat and maybe a carpet or wood flooring, then it's definitely a basement, and never a cellar. A cellar has a concrete slab foundation floor and cinderblock or stone walls, and smells musty, and has a scary-looking hot water heater and furnace in it, with cobwebs all over the place and maybe just one or two lightbulbs hanging down in unadorned sockets from the ceiling.
13. "Parlor" In some of the nicer houses, the parlor would be the front room, too small to be a formal living room but too big to be a foyer. That, and the place you go for a slice of pizza.
14. "Soda" or "Tonic" - Tonic is what they call soda in Boston. Soda, in Boston, means soda water. But if you ask for a soda in Boston, and you clearly don't have a Boston accent, they usually know that you're looking for a soda, not soda water. On the other hand, most people in Boston don't call it tonic, either. They just call it a Coke and they mean "whatever brand of cola-flavored carbonated beverage you have."
15. Regular coffee means "cream and two sugars" I always thought that was universal til I went to Texas and they asked me how I wanted it. I repeated "regular" and they showed me a medium cup and said "yeah that's regular. How do you want it?" I think they said y'all though, not you
16. "Quarter of" for the time... This was a shocker when I learned that people had no idea what I meant when I said I'd meet them at "quarter of."
17. "Dungarees" That's what we called it when we were kids.
18. "Pocket book" In some places this is a purse, others, a bag. Pocketbook doesn't really make sense, since it's neither a book, nor does it fit in your pocket.
19. "Draw" This is sort of a New Hampshire thing. But they put more emphasis on the W. Like - Dra-wuh. Almost.
20. "Huck" Boys would hock a louie, meaning - snort and then blow out a gob of snot through their nose, or spit a gob of snot. But I don't recall ever hearing it called huck.
21. "Frappe" That's another Bostonism, because traditionally in Boston, a milk-shake is milk with chocolate or strawberry syrup, shaken together. If you add ice cream it's called a frappe.
22. "Down the road" Heh for me, up and down the road depends on where we are, and where we're trying to go. If we're moving toward "downtown" it's down the road. If we're moving away from "downtown" it's up the road. If we're nowhere near downtown and going just a little way, it's down the road. If we're going a long way, it's up the road.
23. "Rotary" Interchangeable with traffic circle, to me.
24. "Tractor trailer" A tractor trailer is the whole thing - the truck with the box attached. A semi (in my social circle) was the truck without the box attached.
25. "Lollipop" That's what I heard them called no matter where I am.
26. "Jeet yet" Jeet yet is universal New Englandish. So is "chup-to."
27. "Hoodsie cup" Hoodsie cup or ice cream cup - interchangeable, but we usually called them Hoodsie cups, because we got them from the Hoodsie truck. We had both Good Humor and Hoodsie in our neighborhood.
28. "I'm all set" No thank you, and I'm finished, and I'm ready to go/prepared for the next thing on the agenda. I've heard it everywhere I've been, nationwide.
29. "Bureau" The tall thing is a bureau. The wide thing is a dresser.
30. "Supermarket" interchangeable with grocery store around here. The smaller chains, I always call the IGA, even if they're not strictly IGAs. But that's from back when the choices were the IGA, Food Mart, and Pegnataro's.
31. "Frost heaves" never heard of it.
32. "Hots" In my mind that refers to the spicy frankfurters. There are weiners and red-hots.
33. "Elastic" I always called it rubber bands. Elastic was the stretchy waist-band on a pair of pull-up pants.
34. "Statie" Never heard of it.
35. "Triple deckah" There's a three-family home, and a triple-decker sandwich - aka a club sandwich, but we never called either a triple-decker OR a triple-deckah, not even in Boston.
36. "Butts" When I smoked, I sometimes would go for some butts at the packy, or bum a butt off a passer-by when I was slumming it in Harvard Square. I usually just called them Camels though
37. "Clickah" I didn't check this to see what it meant. I'm not familiar with its use.
38. "Packy" Yep - package store. Always called a packy.
39. "Rubbish" We were brought up hearing this as exchangeable with garbage and trash. We had a garbage disposal in the sink - but we took out the rubbish or the trash.
As Woody Allen pointed out, the response to "J'eet yet?" is anti-Semitic.
"No, jew?"
Btw, many places call both this question and the response part of their own singular dialect, e.g. Pittsburghese.
Distance in time, jimmies (only chocolate, as noted above other colors were 'sprinkles'), hang a uey, kitty corner, cellar, regular coffee, quarter of, dungarees, pocket book, frappe (milk shake at Friendly's only), rotary, tractor trailer, bureau, lollipop, supermarket, frost heaves, elastic, packy... all very familiar to me. The rest of them, no, although I've certainly heard wicked, clickah, idear and suppah used.
I grew up in SW CT, but now live in Pittsburgh. My wife says there are three words I pronounce distinctly different: water (warter or warder), coffee (cawfee), and drawer (drawr with just the slightest hint of the r).
The ones I'm totally unfamiliar with being from NY (I.e. Never heard of of, not once): Jeezum and Crow, jimmies, bubbler, door yard, fluffnutter sandwich, huck, hoodsie cup, frost heaves, hots, elastic, packy, statie, triple decker...all of these words/terms mean noting to me
2. "We measure distance in time." I've never heard of this as any kind of common trend, but it makes sense since most people aren't really looking for actual distance, but rather how long it takes to get from point A to point B.
3. "Jimmies" The chocolate ones were called jimmies. Colored ones were sprinkles. And the fun-shaped ones like flat dots and stars were called shots.
4. "Wicked" This isn't even really Bostonian, as much as it is northeastern MA (such as Marblehead and Salem).
5. "Idear" This is not Connecticut at all, but it is definitely Rhode Island and eastern MA.
6. "Suppah" That's all Boston.
7. "Bang a uey" We used to say hang a U-ey...like, hang a left, hang a right, hang a u-ey. Never bang though.
8. "Bubbler" It's bubblah - and it's Boston.
9. "Kitty corner" I never knew it wasn't called that everywhere, til I left CT and heard catty-corner, caddy-corner, cat-a-corner, and the more correct "diagonal."
10. "Door yard" Never heard of this.
11. "Fluffernutter sandwich" That was a national commercial wasn't it? The Fluff commercial telling how to make a fluffernutter sandwich with fluff and peanutbutter? I always thought it was nationally known.
12. "Cellar" This one's interesting with my family. Cellar was what we called the lower level IF we were going through the Bilco door. Basement is what we called it when descending from inside the first floor of the house down the staircase. Also, if it's finished, with an actual room with walls and heat and maybe a carpet or wood flooring, then it's definitely a basement, and never a cellar. A cellar has a concrete slab foundation floor and cinderblock or stone walls, and smells musty, and has a scary-looking hot water heater and furnace in it, with cobwebs all over the place and maybe just one or two lightbulbs hanging down in unadorned sockets from the ceiling.
13. "Parlor" In some of the nicer houses, the parlor would be the front room, too small to be a formal living room but too big to be a foyer. That, and the place you go for a slice of pizza.
14. "Soda" or "Tonic" - Tonic is what they call soda in Boston. Soda, in Boston, means soda water. But if you ask for a soda in Boston, and you clearly don't have a Boston accent, they usually know that you're looking for a soda, not soda water. On the other hand, most people in Boston don't call it tonic, either. They just call it a Coke and they mean "whatever brand of cola-flavored carbonated beverage you have."
15. Regular coffee means "cream and two sugars" I always thought that was universal til I went to Texas and they asked me how I wanted it. I repeated "regular" and they showed me a medium cup and said "yeah that's regular. How do you want it?" I think they said y'all though, not you
16. "Quarter of" for the time... This was a shocker when I learned that people had no idea what I meant when I said I'd meet them at "quarter of."
17. "Dungarees" That's what we called it when we were kids.
18. "Pocket book" In some places this is a purse, others, a bag. Pocketbook doesn't really make sense, since it's neither a book, nor does it fit in your pocket.
19. "Draw" This is sort of a New Hampshire thing. But they put more emphasis on the W. Like - Dra-wuh. Almost.
20. "Huck" Boys would hock a louie, meaning - snort and then blow out a gob of snot through their nose, or spit a gob of snot. But I don't recall ever hearing it called huck.
21. "Frappe" That's another Bostonism, because traditionally in Boston, a milk-shake is milk with chocolate or strawberry syrup, shaken together. If you add ice cream it's called a frappe.
22. "Down the road" Heh for me, up and down the road depends on where we are, and where we're trying to go. If we're moving toward "downtown" it's down the road. If we're moving away from "downtown" it's up the road. If we're nowhere near downtown and going just a little way, it's down the road. If we're going a long way, it's up the road.
23. "Rotary" Interchangeable with traffic circle, to me.
24. "Tractor trailer" A tractor trailer is the whole thing - the truck with the box attached. A semi (in my social circle) was the truck without the box attached.
25. "Lollipop" That's what I heard them called no matter where I am.
26. "Jeet yet" Jeet yet is universal New Englandish. So is "chup-to."
27. "Hoodsie cup" Hoodsie cup or ice cream cup - interchangeable, but we usually called them Hoodsie cups, because we got them from the Hoodsie truck. We had both Good Humor and Hoodsie in our neighborhood.
28. "I'm all set" No thank you, and I'm finished, and I'm ready to go/prepared for the next thing on the agenda. I've heard it everywhere I've been, nationwide.
29. "Bureau" The tall thing is a bureau. The wide thing is a dresser.
30. "Supermarket" interchangeable with grocery store around here. The smaller chains, I always call the IGA, even if they're not strictly IGAs. But that's from back when the choices were the IGA, Food Mart, and Pegnataro's.
31. "Frost heaves" never heard of it.
32. "Hots" In my mind that refers to the spicy frankfurters. There are weiners and red-hots.
33. "Elastic" I always called it rubber bands. Elastic was the stretchy waist-band on a pair of pull-up pants.
34. "Statie" Never heard of it.
35. "Triple deckah" There's a three-family home, and a triple-decker sandwich - aka a club sandwich, but we never called either a triple-decker OR a triple-deckah, not even in Boston.
36. "Butts" When I smoked, I sometimes would go for some butts at the packy, or bum a butt off a passer-by when I was slumming it in Harvard Square. I usually just called them Camels though
37. "Clickah" I didn't check this to see what it meant. I'm not familiar with its use.
38. "Packy" Yep - package store. Always called a packy.
39. "Rubbish" We were brought up hearing this as exchangeable with garbage and trash. We had a garbage disposal in the sink - but we took out the rubbish or the trash.
Don't forget Western New England. We say "Grinders" for "subs", "mootz-a-rell cheese", "tag sale", "blinker", and "clicker". Can't forget "coo-pon" or coupon... hate when people say "Q-pon"
Oh and it's "couldn't care less" not "could care less" people..
I'm right there with you with the "hang a u-ey". I did grow up saying just "draw" for "drawer" in fact I still say it that way.
Outside of New England people pronounce the "t" in "often" ughh..
"Pockabook" is 100% New England only. "Lollipop" is 100% everywhere...
I think some weirdo from Michigan wrote these.. lmao. They say weird stuff and are confused by our speech.
Don't forget Western New England. We say "Grinders" for "subs", "mootz-a-rell cheese", "tag sale", "blinker", and "clicker". Can't forget "coo-pon" or coupon... hate when people say "Q-pon"
Oh and it's "couldn't care less" not "could care less" people..
I'm right there with you with the "hang a u-ey". I did grow up saying just "draw" for "drawer" in fact I still say it that way.
Outside of New England people pronounce the "t" in "often" ughh..
"Pockabook" is 100% New England only. "Lollipop" is 100% everywhere...
I think some weirdo from Michigan wrote these.. lmao. They say weird stuff and are confused by our speech.
No. We don't say moots a rell. The eyetalians say moots a rell.
No. We don't say moots a rell. The eyetalians say moots a rell.
Must be a Stratford thing. Us proper New Havenites call it MUTZ. Just mutz. And it only refers to pizza. There's really no reason to ever use the word any other time.
"I wanna large mutz."
"Medium mutz with mushrooms."
"Small mutz and pepperoni."
Must be a Stratford thing. Us proper New Havenites call it MUTZ. Just mutz. And it only refers to pizza. There's really no reason to ever use the word any other time.
"I wanna large mutz."
"Medium mutz with mushrooms."
"Small mutz and pepperoni."
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