We don't talk as slowly up here, but what we have to say sure takes a lot longer

When my husband and I happen to get a workday off together, which occurs about every six weeks, we almost invariably spend at least an hour and a half in some bookstore somewhere. We did that this week, too, and as we were leaving, my eyes fell upon a title: Well Butter My Butt and Call Me a Biscuit. I didn’t buy the book, but it caused me to recall the colorful language of the South.


Up here, we just don’t have that. In fact, unless it’s going to come out in dollars and cents, our imaginations can be very limited, when it comes to our words. But we sure have plenty to say.


Did you already notice, as I did, how wordy my posts are and how succinct LLB’s posts are? I’ll admit it: although LLB doesn’t have what I would consider anything near a southern accent and drawl, I wonder if being a Southerner causes one to limit one’s words, because they take much longer to say and require so much more effort and calories. Up here, we just rattle on and on and on, as though people are dying to hear our opinions. You know -- it takes less time to talk here, so perhaps we have an insatiable desire to fill up our talk-vessels by saying a lot more?


After all, was it not in the northwestern states that the irrepressible “ya know what I mean” at the end of every second sentence – the bane of every English instructor in the nation -- was created? And was it not a famous Yankee (although he was admittedly from St. Louis) who invented “déjà vu all over again”? Furthermore, I know two young ladies from my synagogue up here who started the Redundancy Redundancy club on Facebook.


Oh, and listen to a Northwesterner praying publicly! Lotsawords! And no, the most oft-used word in their prayers is not “G-d” or “L-rd” or “we pray“ as might be supposed. In fact, it’s a filler-word, something at which the Northwesterner is particularly practiced. What is it? It’s “just.” That’s right.

. . . and L-rd, we’re just so grateful that You just stepped

right into that situation and just helped Moonglow and

Shia when they were just lost in the desert. We just thank

You that You just brought them back safely and that when

we just pray, You just show up every time. . . .

But perhaps the worst Northwestern verbal redundancy faux pas is the unexpected one that developed over the years I was away from the West Coast: the “is-is.”


As I was driving my little family from Minneapolis back to my hometown in California in 1983, I was listening to the radio, and I heard the “is-is” for the first time. I chalked it up to simply being an oddity of speech for the person I was listening to. However, I heard it over and over on the West Coast – on the radio, on TV news, at school, and more! Since you Southerners are probably completely stumped at this one, I will explain then end this long post.


This is what they say: “Well, the problem is-is that your strategy. . . .” I’m serious! You cannot be in California more than about a week before you hear someone use the “is-is!” “Well sometimes, the color is-is. . . .” Seriously! And one time, I was listening to the radio, and the speaker said “is-is-is”! No Kidding! Three in a row!

Worse, the “is-is” has recently crept out of California, as far north as Washington. It was only a couple days ago that I heard it on the radio here. Unnnnhhhhh!