I’m a fan of those joke-a-day desk calendars. A recent entry on my new 2008 calendar, focusing on humorous insults, contained this supposedly “Southern expression”: “She’s uglier than a lard bucket full of armpits.”
This made me chortle a bit, but rest assured that as a near-native of this area with family roots going way back in the South, I have never heard anyone say this.
I have, however, heard newcomers repeatedly comment on Southern expressions they find either charming or somewhat perplexing, such as the ever-present “Bless your heart” – is it cloaked insult or true empathy?
A personal favorite of mine is “tickled pink.” How could you not smile if someone told you they felt that way? And I've heard the insult that someone is "dumber than a sack of hammers." I also enjoy stories that involve hollerin’ or skeedaddling somewhere.
A friend mentioned he hears about “Adam’s housecat” down here sometimes – as in, “I wouldn’t know that guy from Adam’s housecat.”
What about you? What are some favorite Southern expressions you’ve heard – or need translation for? Post 'em here.
Blog Archive
Popular Posts
-
I'm sharing a sneak preview of my column running in this Sunday's paper: After a year and a half spent meeting newcomers, hearing th...
-
Who was W.T. Harris? Where was Sardis? What’s the Community House? Turns out, lots of folks out there want to know more about how Charlotte’...
-
Thanks to the relative strength of North Carolina’s filmmaking industry, the state is usually represented in films at the annual Sundance Fi...
-
This is a difficult blog entry for me to write. It’s a story that reflects poorly on me, as some of my more feisty posters will no doubt qui...
-
Anybody see today’s editorial page in The Observer? It read like one of my old North vs. South blog entries. The first writer led off with t...
-
There aren't many things more maddening than a cell phone dead zone. Especially when it happens in the middle of the largest city in the...
-
When it’s a dark Halloween night at one of Mecklenburg County’s oldest surviving properties, everything takes on a certain spookiness. A bre...
-
With tens of thousands of people sampling Charlotte’s first light-rail line this weekend, the advice is flying. People with light-rail exper...
-
We live in a great place for road trips, and this past weekend brought me ample opportunity to be reminded of that. First, I headed to Durha...
-
This is a long-overdue update post. When I last wrote, I was headed into the adventure of full-time editing for the Observer's Neighbors...