We haven't had a good dialect thread in a while...post your southernisms
He’s/she’s a mess! (mess — funny, nutty, etc.)
Goin’ to carry my folks to church. (carry — drive)
Greens and pot likker
I’ll try to thing of something while I warsh my truck.
Ah, dude, I've lived in the Western US (specifically CA) for the totality of my life. So, like, I really can't add much to the conversation here, man.
“We haven’t had a good dialect thread in a while...post your southernisms”
here’s one...the preacher will now “make prayer” instead of saying the preacher will now ‘pray’
here’s another....Jim Wilson is the ‘high sheriff’ of Ashe County
my neighbor makes his sour kraut when ‘the signs’ are right...that means the points of the moon are up.
Stonewalls, who lives deep in the mountains of North Carolina
The one word that absolutely stumped me was “dreckly”.
I was grown before I found out that wasn’t really a word, but rather a Southern form of “directly”.
Use: I’ll be home dreckly (i.e. soon or right away).
Having traveled a bit, I can tell you that there is no single Southron accent or dialect. Tennessee and Alabama are NOT the same accent by a long stretch, and NOLA and West Texas are miles apart literally and linguistically. However, I CAN tell you that there are three things that clearly indicate you’re still in the South (or at least in the presence of those from the homeland):
1) People don’t act like you are odd for asking where the “Coke,” instead of soda or pop machine, is when you want to get a carbonated beverage.
2) You can see kudzu.
3) When you order tea in a restaurant, a) they don’t EVER have to check to see if they have it made, and b) they ask if you want it sweet or not.
My mother-in-law uses this phrase “I’m not for sure about that.” Source of irritation for me, but common Texanism. Grandfather, who has a Georgia accent like most native Florida crackers, often sounds more like a Maine-iac with his ayuh’s than any coonass (I still think the NOLA accent sounds like the damnyankees settled in too long).
I’m fixin to go. I’m remembering my grandpa “fixin” his old T-Model tires, or his harness when using a wagon to go into town. It could be that was the etymology of the expression.