I enjoy this sort of thing way too much

[lirazel]

Stolen from shipperx: Go to google and type "you know you're from [your state] when... and bold the ones that apply.


You've never met any celebrities -- other than Fred Thompson. [Hahaha! I love this one!]

"Vacation" means going to the family reunion.

You know all four seasons: Almost Summer, Summer, Still Summer, and Christmas.

You laugh when people from anywhere north of Tennessee try to say or spell "y'all." [Listen very carefully to me, people of the earth: It's Y'ALL. Absolutely not ya'll. It's a contraction of "you" and "all." Putting the apostrophe after the a DOESN'T MAKE ANY SENSE and makes you look dumb. Thank you.]

It's "Mar-vull," not "Mary-ville." [One of my best friends is from Maryville!]

It's "Knox-vull," not "Knox-ville."

A toboggan is a hat, not a sled.

You butter your hot biscuit by cutting it open, putting a slab of butter inside, and closing it back up again. [This one confuses me. How else would you butter a biscuit?]

Pigeon Forge is not pronounced with a French accent.

Gatlinburg does have an "L" in it and it should be pronounced. [Who pronounces it differently? Seriously?]

Sales tax is 9.75%.

You shop at Wal-Mart for groceries, not at a grocery store. [Well, I don't, because I love in "the city." But all of my relatives in various small towns scattered across the state do, and that's where I shop when I'm with them--which is often. So I'll bold this one.]

You don't drive in Knoxville on game day. EVER. [I've never had any reason to be anywhere near Knoxville during that time, but even I know the truth of this statement, and I would never, under any circumstances, do this.]

You or your friends chew. [Well, I don't, obviously, because I think it's the nastiest thing in the universe, but yeah, I have friends who do. Unfortunately.]

You can't remember the last time you saw snow.

You know when Elvis Presley Day is.

You know all of the words to "Rocky Top."

You avoid going anywhere near Bristol Motor Speedway on race weekend. [Again, never had any reason to be in that area on race weekend, but I know enough not to.]

You think it's worth it driving to Alabama just to save 1.25% on the sales tax. [Ha!]

You eat "dinner" at noon and "supper" in the evening. [It's slightly more complicated than that. "Dinner" is your large meal of the day, whenever you eat it--so it's always "Sunday dinner," even though we eat it at noon--but supper has to be at night. So supper can also be dinner, but dinner isn't necessarily supper.]

Your Wal-Mart has specific parking spots for horses and buggies. [Okay, now you're just being silly.]

You use "commode" in conversations and absolutely no one knows what you're talking about. [This confuses me, too. I mean, yeah, I use that word. But people know what I'm talking about. Doesn't everybody use that word?]

You barely get snow days because there's hardly ever any snow. Better yet, you get snow days if your local weather stations predict even the slightest bit of snow!

You and everyone you know goes to one vacation spot: Panama City. [We aren't big beach people, so we go to, like, Washington D.C. instead, but yeah, everybody I know who's middle class definitely goes to Panama City. All of my rich friends, though, go to, like, Sanibel.]

You know how to do the watermelon crawl. [Um, no. I don't line dance.]

Everything is COKE, and if you don't like it, tough. Ex: "You want a COKE?" "Sure." "Which kind?" "Dr. Pepper." [YES.]

You're in a Carhartt jacket one day, shorts the next, and no one thinks anything about it. [Well, except for the Carhartt part.]

Everyone you know owns a truck, and at least one of those trucks is just painted with primer or more colors than the rainbow. [I love my truck. I'm always going to drive a truck.]

You measure distance in minutes, not miles.

You drive through a rich neighborhood and see the wannabe redneck kids with their brand-new Fords and their designer holey jeans and cowboy hats. [Yeah, rich kids either pretend to be rednecks or pretend to be gangster. I laugh at all of them.]

Boomsday in Knoxville is equal to New Year's Eve at Times Square.

Knoxville becomes the third largest city every Saturday in the fall. [Actually, I think it's always the third largest, but it becomes significantly larger on game day. SIGNIFICANTLY. See: the one about not driving there.]

Sweet tea is THE DRINK...no questions, no exceptions. Most people from Tennessee begin drinking sweet tea even before they can drink out of sippy cups. Iced tea is appropriate for all meals, and you start drinking it when you're two. We do like a little tea with our sugar! [Oh, amen!]

You've ever had to switch from "heat" to "A/C" in the same day.

You use "fix" as a verb. Example: "I'm fixing to go to the store." [Most useful verb EVER.]

All the festivals across the state are named after a fruit, vegetable, grain, insect, or animal. [One day, I want to travel to all the state festivals and write a book about it--the Catfish festival, the RC Cola and Moon Pie festival, Mule Day, etc. I think it would be way fun.]

You install security lights on your house and garage and leave both unlocked. [Again, we don't because we live in "the city," but all of my relatives do this. They never lock their doors because you don't have to in small towns.]

You know what a "DAWG" is. [Oh, God. Let's pretend like I don't.]

You carry jumper cables in your car -- for your OWN car. [This baffles me. Who else would they be for? I mean, sure, you let people borrow them if they need them, but what?]

You own only four spices: salt, pepper, Tabasco, and ketchup. [I, currently, only do own these four "spices." My mama has lots more, of course, but I think everyone knows you could make do with only these and be perfectly fine.]

The local papers cover national and international news on one page but require six pages for local gossip and sports.

You think that the first day of deer season is a national holiday.

You find 100 degrees Fahrenheit "a little warm."

Fried catfish is "the other white meat." [And I'm having it TODAY!]

You describe the first cool snap (below 70 degrees) as good pinto-bean weather. [Or good chili weather.]

You're convinced you don't need driver's ed -- your father's and uncles' pickup trucks were training enough.

Possums sleep in the middle of the road with their feet in the air. [I feel like I have been seeing so many dead possums in the road lately. Like, more than usual. And I can't figure out why. In other news, possums are the grossest creatures in the world.]

There are 5,000 types of snakes, and 4,998 live in Tennessee.

There are 10,000 types of spiders. All 10,000 live in Tennessee plus a couple no one's seen before.

If it grows, it sticks; if it crawls, it bites. [CHIGGERS ARE THE DEVIL'S OWN CREATION. Seriously. God created the world and then there was the fall. And THEN the devil created chiggers.]

Onced and twiced are words.

It is not a shopping cart; it is a buggy.

Fire ants consider your flesh a picnic.

People actually grow and eat okra. [Favorite food!]

"Fixinto" is one word.

Backards and forwards means "I know everything about you."

Jeet? is actually a phrase meaning "Did you eat?" [This is one of my uncle's favorite jokes.]

You don't have to wear a watch because it doesn't matter what time it is. You work until you're done or it's too dark to see.

And, while we're at it, this one, too, which is also from shipperx: Comment and I will give you ten actors and ten actresses. Then post in your Livejournal with your favorite films of theirs.

Actors:
Michael Caine: The Man Who Would Be King
Clive Owen: Children of Men
James McAvoy: Bright Young Things. Featuring David Tennant in a bad moustache!
Robin Williams: Uh, Aladdin? I don't like Robin Williams.
Montgomery Clift: I Confess
Henry Fonda: Twelve Angry Men. Also, because my sister and I watched it six million times when we were young, Yours, Mine, and Ours.
Lawrence Olivier:: Rebecca
Dustin Hoffman: Finding Neverland. Although this is reminding me that I really need to see All the President's Men.
Hugh Grant: Sense and Sensibility


Actresses:
Bette Davis: All About Eve. But I want to see Now, Voyager
Diane Keaton: Father of the Birde
Anne Hathaway: I'm not that fond of her, and I've seen relatively few things she's in, so I guess I'm gonna go with The Princess Diaries, which is silly but endearing.
Molly Ringwald: The Breakfast Club. But I'm not a huge John Hughes fan.
Audrey Hepburn: Charade.
Demi Moore: True story: I've never seen anything she's in. Really.
Goldie Hawn: Yeah, never seen anything with her, either.
Sarah Jessica Parker: I've seen some stuff she's in...but I don't like any of it. Sorry!
Cate Blanchett: The Talented Mr. Ripley
Kate Winslet: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Or Sense and SEnsibility.

Comments

[molly_may]

Listen very carefully to me, people of the earth: It's Y'ALL. Absolutely not ya'll.

YES! And I have to add, it's such a convenient contraction that I don't understand why it's regional to only the South!

You butter your hot biscuit by cutting it open, putting a slab of butter inside, and closing it back up again. [This one confuses me. How else would you butter a biscuit?]

I don't know? Butter on top maybe? That seems like a weak distribution of the butter, though.

People actually grow and eat okra. [Favorite food!]

My only question is, why WOULDN'T people eat okra? Mmmmm...okra.

[penny-lane-42.livejournal.com]

I don't get it, either. It's fixing an inherent weakness in the English language!

Butter on top? No! Sometimes that's okay with rolls--like the ones at O'Charleys or Logan's, where they're so light and fluffy that trying to cut them just mashes them to nothingness. But biscuits must have butter in the middle!

I love okra so much. Whenever I go to a meat-and-three, I always order a double serving of fried okra. YUM.

[molly_may]

Truthfully, I usually skip the meat portion of the meat and three and just order four veggies. Fried okra is ALWAYS one of my choices. With sweet tea to drink, of course.

[penny-lane-42.livejournal.com]

My mama does that, too; she's not a big meat person. But I am never one to turn down fried chicken or fried catfish!

My family is super-thrifty, so we always order water at restaurants. Now that I'm on my own, it's taken a lot of time for me to convince myself that it's okay to spend money on a drink! But now I order sweet tea, of course.

Whenever I leave the country, the first thing I always do when I get back is to get sweet tea to drink. I always get an Arizona sweet tea in the airport, but that is not the real thing--it's just to tide me over until I can get REAL sweet tea.

My cousin-I-call-aunt makes the best tea punch in the world. It's the only thing in the world I like to drink more than regular ole sweet tea.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

WHo needs food at Logan's. Just eat the rolls!

[eilowyn.livejournal.com]

True story: rich kids in California like to pretend to be rednecks or gangstas, too. And they all drive flashy, new heavy duty Toyota trucks, lifted to the sky. They're also disporportionally white, so it shows the mud from going "off-roading" better.

Yours, Mine and Ours was based on some childhood friends of my father's. They all went to Catholic school together, and the Beardsley house is now a rehab center.

And I'm game for the actor/actress meme.

ETA: did you change the name of your LJ? Where's the emotional resonance and rocket launchers?

[penny-lane-42.livejournal.com]

Ha! It just goes to show you that you can find rednecks anywhere, I guess.

A lot of not-as-rich white people try to act like gangsters, too. I remember one time my friends and I were at the Walmart in Sparta (which is a very, very tiny town). And it was night, so all the kids were hanging out in the parking lot, because that is what teenagers do in small towns in TN. And they were all dressed in gangster clothing. And my friend Mallory rolled down the window and shouted out, "YOU'RE IN SPARTA! WHAT ARE YOU WEARING?"

Seriously? THAT IS SO COOL. My sister and I were in love with that movie. Lucille Ball and Henry Fonda? SO FUN.

Actors: Chiwetel Ejiofor (MY FAVORITE), Bill Nighy, Brad Pitt, Ed Harris, Jimmy Stewart, Peter O'Toole, J.K. Simmons, Steve McQueen, Matthew Goode, Lawrence Fishburne

Actresses: Vivien Leigh, Frances McDormand, Robin Wright Penn (hee!), Emily Blunt, Helen Mirren, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Queen Latifah, Katherine Hepburn, Rita Moreno, Lily Tomlin

I did! Just a moment ago! The new title is a quote from the DW finale. But I'll robably go back to emotional resonance and rocket launchers at some point. Right now, I'm too starry-eyed over how much I loved this series of DW.

[next_to_normal]

This one confuses me. How else would you butter a biscuit?

Well, I cut it open and butter each half. No putting them back together.

True story: I've never seen anything she's in. Really.

Heh, this is why I am not doing this meme. I'm pretty sure that'd be my answer for most of them.

[penny-lane-42.livejournal.com]

Aha! Now that I think about it, my grandmama does that. Makes sense!

I've seen a whole lot of movies, but I don't watch many of the more mainstream modern ones--I'm picky. So some of those were hard for me.

[that-september.livejournal.com]

You laugh when people from anywhere north of Tennessee try to say or spell "y'all." [Listen very carefully to me, people of the earth: It's Y'ALL. Absolutely not ya'll. It's a contraction of "you" and "all." Putting the apostrophe after the a DOESN'T MAKE ANY SENSE and makes you look dumb. Thank you.]

YES. Oh my GOD, this drives me insane, especially when I see people from the south spelling it ya'll. Wtf. *shudder* One of my biggest spelling pet peeves.


And lolol at not knowing any other way to butter your biscuit. I think the other way is just individually buttering each half and not closing it back up. I've seen people do that.

:]

[penny-lane-42.livejournal.com]

Definitely! I don't normally correct random people's spelling/grammar, but I have a hard time NOT correcting them about that one!

Yeah, that's what someone else said, too, and now that I think about it, I know people who eat them that way.

Hey! How was the sequel last night? I didn't get a chance to see it. Funny? Lots of girl!Draco?

[that-september.livejournal.com]

Oh, it was funny, and there was plenty of girl!Draco. I died laughing more than once. I think they nailed it again; I probably didn't like it as much as AVPM, but that's to be expected. The lack of Quirrelmort was disappointing!

[penny-lane-42.livejournal.com]

Yay! Sounds good! I'll check it out this weekend.

Quirrelmot was the second best thing about AVPM. I will miss them!

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

You butter your hot biscuit by cutting it open, putting a slab of butter inside, and closing it back up again. [This one confuses me. How else would you butter a biscuit?]

If there's another way, I've never heard of it (except with hungry jack pop-can ones, in which case they must be deconstructed layer by layer when you eat them.)

You know all of the words to "Rocky Top."

Can I pretend that I don't? Half the incentive for scoring is so that we won't have to hear you guys sing that song! :)

You avoid going anywhere near Bristol Motor Speedway on race weekend.

Name replace with Talladega and it's the same deal. I live many, many miles away and it screws up traffic even here.

You use "commode" in conversations and absolutely no one knows what you're talking about. [This confuses me, too. I mean, yeah, I use that word. But people know what I'm talking about.

I know what you're talking about.

Sweet tea is THE DRINK...no questions, no exceptions. Most people from Tennessee begin drinking sweet tea even before they can drink out of sippy cups. Iced tea is appropriate for all meals, and you start drinking it when you're two. We do like a little tea with our sugar! [Oh, amen!]

It's summer. I make a glass every day for lunch... as dessert. I need my caffeine, y'all!

Fire ants consider your flesh a picnic.

And are evil!!!

People actually grow and eat okra. [Favorite food!]

Local restaurant owner of Baja Burger mixes fried okra in with his french fries. It's the best idea EVER!

[penny-lane-42.livejournal.com]

Oh, yeah, the layer-peeling! I like those, except they aren't really biscuits in my mind. But I always enjoyed the layer-peeling.

Liking "Rocky Top" is kind of a survival skill here. I mean it gets played ALL THE TIME. I don't know any other team that plays a song quite as often as we play that one.

We always drive past Talladega on our way to visit our friends who live in that general vicinity, and we make sure to always drive when there's no race.

Tea is the only kind of caffeine I drink. I like hot tea, too. But sweet tea is the NECTAR OF THE GODS.

Nothing's as evil as fire ants. Except maybe chiggers.

That is, indeed, the best idea EVER. I might die of happiness if I ever saw that.

[gwtwscarlett.livejournal.com]

Is commode a kind of drawer? We have the same word here:)

Now Voyager is gorgeous, you must see it! But I also love All About Eve, oh the snarkiness. Sometimes I wonder if Spike had picked up his sense of humor from watching old movies with his mother or Drusilla, lol.

[penny-lane-42.livejournal.com]

Ha! No, here it means the toilet, actually. I'm not sure why.

I now have added Spike watching old movies with Dru and developing his sense of humor from them to my personal canon.

[gwtwscarlett.livejournal.com]

LOL, not that similar after all :)

[i]
I now have added Spike watching old movies with Dru and developing his sense of humor from them to my personal canon.[/i]

And LOL again. I always thought there is a connection between classic movies and great television, even if just bringing quality to the screen. Who could have been Spike's favorites? I think he liked the "snarky, lonely type women are drawn to" like Humphrey Bogart or Clark Gable. And I think he liked women strong and a little crazy, like Gene Tierney in Leave Her To Heaven or Bette Davis in All About Eve.

[xlivvielockex.livejournal.com]

I think with the biscuit thing maybe cutting it in half and buttering both sides? Maybe?

And I loooove okra, sfm. And the closest I've come to living in the south was Southern Arizona. LOL

[penny-lane-42.livejournal.com]

That seems to be the common consensus, so we'll go with that.

I really don't know why it's not more popular! It's so good!

[local-max.livejournal.com]

I am also game for actors/actresses!

(And after it's done, assuming there are no repeats I will comment on yours and eilowyn's.)

[penny-lane-42.livejournal.com]

Okay!

Actors: James Coburn, Denzel Washington, Antonio Banderas, Michael Gambon, Paul Giamatti, Paul Newman, Simon Pegg, Mark Ruffalo, Cary Grant, Rupert Everett

Actresses: Uma Thurman, Kirsten Dunst, Emma Thompson, Ava Gardner, Laura Linney, Olivia Williams, Myrna Loy, Judi Dench, Amy Adams, Kathy Bates

[local-max.livejournal.com]

Done! Now just to keep on it (and avoid other, more stremuous activities) on your comments:

Actors:
Michael Caine: probably Hannah and Her Sisters

Clive Owen: Children of Men --> yes

James McAvoy: Haven't seen BYT. Havnen't seen much actually. Wanted, maybe, of the, like, two I've seen? (Morally repugnant, but I thought that Last King of Scotland aimed higher and failed)

Robin Williams: Uh, Aladdin? I don't like Robin Williams. --> I like Robin Williams okay but I fully approve of

Montgomery Clift: I Confess --> haven't seen yet. Probably A Place in the Sun.

Henry Fonda: Twelve Angry Men. --> Yes

Lawrence Olivier:: Rebecca --> Yes

Dustin Hoffman: Finding Neverland. Although this is reminding me that I really need to see All the President's Men. --> All the President's Men is amazing. Go see All the President's Men. (Well, actually it took two viewings for its awesomness to sink in. But it's very good!)

Hugh Grant: Sense and Sensibility


Actresses:
Bette Davis: All About Eve. But I want to see Now, Voyager --> N,V is a little creepy in several crucial ways that will be fun to talk about after you've seen it. It's *very* 1940's in its gender politics. But the cast is really good. And it has both Claude Rains and Paul Heinreid! /Casablanca fannishness

Diane Keaton: Father of the Birde --> I'd go with Annie Hall

Anne Hathaway: I'm not that fond of her, and I've seen relatively few things she's in, so I guess I'm gonna go with The Princess Diaries, which is silly but endearing. --> I haven't seen it. I love Rachel Getting Married.

Molly Ringwald: The Breakfast Club. But I'm not a huge John Hughes fan. --> Not that big a John Hughes fan myself.

Audrey Hepburn: Charade. --> Sure. (I'd go with Roman Holiday.)

Demi Moore: True story: I've never seen anything she's in. Really. --> Ha. My mom hates her passionately, so that's rubbed off on me a bit. But Deconstructing Harry.

Goldie Hawn: Yeah, never seen anything with her, either. --> I like Shampoo, which is the only movie of hers I've seen. (Similar boat!)

Sarah Jessica Parker: I've seen some stuff she's in...but I don't like any of it. Sorry! --> She's great in a minor role in Ed Wood.

Cate Blanchett: The Talented Mr. Ripley --> Ooh, nice pick. I think she's great as Kathryn Hepburn in The Aviator

Kate Winslet: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Or Sense and SEnsibility. --> The former for me.

[penny-lane-42.livejournal.com]

I like Annie Hall on an intellectual level and she's great in it, but for some reason there's a distance between me and the movie that makes me not love it.

Not that big a John Hughes fan myself.

I always feel like the only one when I say this. But his movies just don't really do it for me.

I think I wouldn't like Roman Holiday if it weren't Hepburn and Peck. But since I adore both of them, I do indeed like it lots. ;D

I haven't seen The Aviator, but she's very talented. I'm sure she's great in it.

[local-max.livejournal.com]

I haven't seen many Hughes movies though, so maybe it'll change when I see the right one and then his whole oeuvre clicks into place. Or not?

Roman Holiday: I like the actors as you say. And I also kind of like that it takes the It Happened One Night fairy tale to a slightly more natural conclusion--that, well, love or no love, she's still a princess. That last scene where she surveys the reporters kills me. But yeah, I think the cast is what makes it.

[penny-lane-42.livejournal.com]

Maybe. I haven't seen a ton, either, but I've watched them when they're on TV and nothing really grabs me. I think it might be one of those, "You had to watch it at the right time in your life" things, and I didn't watch any of them till I was already in college.

Yeah, the last scene is fabulous, and I love that the movie has the courage to go there. A mainstream film today wouldn't do that.

[ladyofthelog.livejournal.com]

Awww, I love your TN meme! I dated two guys from Murfreesboro and spent a lot of time there from 2005-2008; it is a state which will always be close to my heart.

[gingerwall.livejournal.com]

Everything is COKE, and if you don't like it, tough. Ex: "You want a COKE?" "Sure." "Which kind?" "Dr. Pepper." Yes! This! Also, A+ for drinking Dr. Pepper.

One of my most humiliating moments was in 1st grade my teacher gave me two quarters and asked me to go to the teacher's lounge (!!!) and get her a coke. I asked her "what kind?" and she laughed in my face. :(

You measure distance in time, not miles.
You've ever had to switch from "heat" to "A/C" in the same day.
You use "fix" as a verb. Example: "I'm fixing to go to the store."
Fire ants consider your flesh a picnic.
People actually grow and eat okra.
You find 100 degrees Fahrenheit "a little warm."
Fried catfish is "the other white meat."
You barely get snow days because there's hardly ever any snow. Better yet, you get snow days if your local weather stations predict even the slightest bit of snow!

Yay to all of those ones too. Texas and Tennessee are basically the same place with a few superficial differences (hold the sugar in my tea please): big state, one main university (color=orange, nickname=UT), liberal and musical capital city in the center of a generally conservative state, same weather, same pick up trucks, and completely full of ourselves. :)

P.S. Thanks for Davy Crockett.
P.P.S. Sorry for leaving this comment three times... the formatting part of my brain is not working today.

[brunettepet.livejournal.com]

The COKE thing cracked me up.

We have jumper cables in the car but just in case. I think the last three or four times we used them it was to jump strangers' cars stranded in a supermarket parking lot. I think it's because we have a 40 year old muscle car, they assume we know how to keep it going!

Fried okra is delicious if it's fresh made. I hate the frozen stuff. It gives fried okra a bad rep.

[ohwaluvusbab.livejournal.com]

It's Y'ALL. Absolutely not ya'll.

People say ya'll? How absurd.

[snickfic]

Buggy! What is it with you southern people and 'buggy'? My Arkansas friends use it, too.

I butter my biscuit by cutting it open and spreading butter on each side with a knife.

No, everyone does not use the word commode.