They didn't mention hotdish, though!

[cosmolinguist]

The weather is usually 80% of your conversation.

When you say "down south" you're referring to Iowa. (Why would anyone talk about that, though?)

You call highways "freeways." (Other people don't do that? They're two different things!)

You've never taken public transportation. (I have now!)

75% of your graduating high school class went to the University of Minnesota. (No, but I did! Most of them weren't that ambitious, though.)

"Perkins" was the only hangout option in high school. (And you have to drive 20 miles to get there!)

You assume when you say "The Cities" people know where you're talking about.

You can list all the "-dales."

People from other states love to hear you say words with "o"s in them.

In a conversation you've heard someone say "yah sure, you betcha" and you didn't laugh.

You hate the movie "Fargo" but realize you and your entire family have that same accent. (No, just some of them.)

You get mad at people who think Fargo is in Minnesota. (So very mad. Ask Andrew.)

You know what Mille Lacs is and how to spell it.

You have fish boiled in lye for Christmas. (No, but we have pickled herring. And lefse. No lutefisk, though.)

You know what "uff-da" means and how to use it properly.

You know the 2 sports-related reasons why we hate Dallas. (Maybe ten years ago...)

Nothing gets you madder than seeing a Green Bay sticker on a MN car. (Bah, silly football.)

The only reason you go to Wisconsin is to get fireworks. (We went to South Dakota. And they're legal again anyway.)

You're a loyal Target shopper. (I miss Target!)

You've frozen your tongue on a metal handrail before. (No, but I saw a kid get his stuck to the jungle gym on the playground when I was in elementary school.)

You own an ice house, a snowmobile, and a 4 wheel drive vehicle. (Just a snowmobile, but my dad pines for the others. Well, he also pines for a snowmobile that works, these days. The one we have is almost as old as I am.)

You wear shorts when it's 50 degrees outside in March, but you bundle up and complain in August when it goes below 60. (And it's been cold in Minnesota recently! Didn't get up to 60 yesterday. Ha! Meanwhile, it's perfect in Manchester, most days. Bit too humid at times; I feel right at home. The locals complain.)

You have gone trick-or-treating in 3 feet of snow. (My brother and I went trick-or-treating just before a still-famous storm when I was nine.)

You've not only walked across a lake, you've driven across one.

Everyone you know has a cabin or, at least, access to one. (I wish I had more access to one!)

You know that Lake Wobegon isn't real and you know who made it up, where they live, and exactly what you want to do about it. (Yeah, but I like him...)

You have friends who schedule their wedding in the middle of January without a thought about weather conditions.

Your local Dairy Queen is closed from December through February.

The temperature in March is above freezing for three days in a row, and you think it's summer.

You laugh out loud every time you see a news report about a blizzard shutting down the entire East Coast.

You know what and where "Dinkytown" is.

When you talk about "opener" you are not talking about cans.

You have refused to buy something because it's too "spendy."

You believe that the Vikings would have won four Super Bowls by now if they were still playing in Metropolitan Stadium.

You are convinced the Twins will never win the pennant because the owners are too cheap to pay the good players, so they all leave. (That's true!)

Your town has an equal number of bars and churches.

You grew up thinking rice was only for dessert. You think that ketchup is a little too spicy. (Sadly, this is true of my mom, so that's the cuisine I grew up on.)

You (or your parents) voted for Mondale. (Both, by this point.)

You've seen "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" in Uptown.

You know that everyone has a city preference -- Minneapolis or St. Paul.

You can honestly claim Germanic / Scandinavian ancestors, and have been known to say "ya" instead of "yes" (I have both Scandinavian and German ancestors, I think.)

Upon seeing an ocean for the first time, you say, "Hey! That looks like Lake Superior!"

Laugh at your state (if you're from one) here.

Comments

[kratkrat.livejournal.com]

Okay, as a geographer, I am compelled to comment and question...

You assume when you say "The Cities" people know where you're talking about.

Shouldn't everyone, as long as they know the topic is Minnesota?

You know what Mille Lacs is and how to spell it.

I give... what is it?

You know what "uff-da" means and how to use it properly. (People don't?)

I don't. Care to buy me a ticket so I can catch the clue bus?

You know the 2 sports-related reasons why we hate Dallas.

Hmmmm.... one would be the North Stars becoming the Dallas Stars. What's the other one? The Herschel Walker trade? That's no reason to hate Dallas... hate the Vikings management, and the offensive scheme that did not use him correctly.

When you talk about "opener" you are not talking about cans.

What are you talking about? Garage doors?

[elkabong.livejournal.com]

The "opener" is the fishing opener - first day of the open season.

[kratkrat.livejournal.com]

Aaah. Not being one for wrangling ichthyoids, this I did not know...

[cosmolinguist]

Mille Lacs is a lake. A big one.

'Uff-da' is an exclamation stereotypically associated with Minnesota because of its large Scandinavian populationn who (supposedly) use it as an introductory interjection. I don't know what it means, exactly...

I don't actually know the other reason we're supposed to hate Dallas; the North Stars one is easy, but the other one is either the one you mentioned or something else I don't know about. :-)

And yes, 'the opener' is the opening weekend of fishing season. It's a big deal; the governor traditionally has to go out fishing and it makes the news. Things like that.

[kratkrat.livejournal.com]

Funny enough, until today I had no idea the start of fishing was so huge in Minnesota. Then, this evening, I went to my folks' place for dinner, and they had on the CBS evening news. There was a story about the Asian Carp, and how they "got loose" from stocked ponds in Louisiana during heavy floods, and have been propagating northward. These things are a plague and are of great concern to naturalists... particularly in Minnesota! The story focussed on the Minnesotan fishing tradition, and how these Asian Carps are a disaster waiting to happen.

So, how about that? I never knew it, and I get two lessons all in the span of a few hours.

[cosmolinguist]

Yeah, I remember lots of ads about how it was important to clean off you boeat so you didn't take any zebra mussels from one lake to the next. Yes, we have real problems here, too, but things like this do matter. :-)

[elkabong.livejournal.com]

The 'dales' are the shopping malls in the burbs - Rosedale, Southdale, Ridgedale, and Hugedale (the code name for MOA)..

[greenflower.livejournal.com]

There's also Brookdale

[ivana-duboise.livejournal.com]

You've frozen your tongue on a metal handrail before.

I was one of those children. I believe I licked the curly slide.

[cosmolinguist]

I bet you would've been an interesting little kid. :-)

[ivana-duboise.livejournal.com]

I was an interesting little kid.

[angel-thane.livejournal.com]

The weather is usually 80% of your conversation.

When you say "down south" you're referring to Iowa. (Why would anyone talk about that, though?)

You call highways "freeways." (Other people don't do that? They're two different things!)

Three more reasons why Minnesota belongs as the 11th or 12th province.

You know what Mille Lacs is and how to spell it.

Wouldn't that just mean that you speak french?

You know what "uff-da" means and how to use it properly. (People don't?)

Huh? As in how to use it properly in a sentence, or is it an object of some kind?

You own an ice house, a snowmobile, and a 4 wheel drive vehicle. (Just a snowmobile, but my dad pines for the others. Well, he also pines for a snowmobile that works, these days. The one we have is almost as old as I am.)

An ice-house? Arn't those generally called igloos? (well technically snow huts, but same difference)

Everyone you know has a cabin or, at least, access to one. (I wish I had more access to one!)

Cabin = cottage?

Your local Dairy Queen is closed from December through February.

Isn't that company policy? Who buys ice cream in the winter?

You laugh out loud every time you see a news report about a blizzard shutting down the entire East Coast.

Absolutely. Of course, for a central Canadian like myself, it's even funnier when a non-blizzard (read: 3 inches of snow) shuts down the west coast.

Upon seeing an ocean for the first time, you say, "Hey! That looks like Lake Superior!"

Well Lake Ontario. And a salty tasting one at that. What's the point?

[hilker.livejournal.com]

Isn't that company policy? Who buys ice cream in the winter?

Californians. My local DQ is open all year.

[angel-thane.livejournal.com]

Yes, but everybody on the left coast is crazy.

[cosmolinguist]

An ice-house? Arn't those generally called igloos?

No! An ice-house is what you put on the lake to go ice-fishing.

Wouldn't that just mean that you speak french?

No one in Minnesota speaks French!

Isn't that company policy? Who buys ice cream in the winter?

No, it's because some of them are just little shacks outside, so they're really cold in winter. There's one near me for which that is the case, anyway. :-)

Well Lake Ontario.

I've never seen Lake Ontario. It's not a Minnesotan thing.

[angel-thane.livejournal.com]

No! An ice-house is what you put on the lake to go ice-fishing

Hmm, we just call them icefishing cabins, or huts, depending on size.

No, it's because some of them are just little shacks outside, so they're really cold in winter. There's one near me for which that is the case, anyway. :-)

Ahh, well the one near my highschool closed in the winter as well.

[hephaestos.livejournal.com]

It pains me somewhat to realize I probably added "spendy" to my vocabulary since moving here without even knowing I did it.

I picked up a lot of regionalisms in Georgia too, they're hard to lose later.

Yeah, I'm a native

[cosmolinguist]

As with so many other things, 'spendy' is the sort of Minnesotan-ism about which I just blink and go, 'What? Other people aren't like that?'

Sure sign of someone who needs to get out more, I suppose. :-)

Ohcheez.

[mwittier.livejournal.com]

What's missing is how Mille Lacs is pronounced: Mlax. All one word. Rhymes with 'tracks' only more nasal.

Even worse is the poetically named Lac qui Parle, which is pronounced as Lackeyparl.

And the word 'don't'-- it has roughly seven syllables.



Remind me why I live here.

[cosmolinguist]

That's good. When I was exlaining Mille Lacs to the guy who asked about it, I was trying to think of a way to spell it phonetically, and just couldn't manage it. I think you did well.

French names just don't translate well into Minnesotan. Obvious examples like 'De-loot' come to mind.

[setharoo.livejournal.com]

"De-loot!" *laughs* Oh, that's so iron-ranger. And, hey, why didn't this list include anything about the Range? There's a lot to laugh at up here...

I was actually in Duluth today, coincidentally. As you know, it's one of my favorite places in the world. When/if you are smuggled back into the states, we should take a trip to Little Angie's. Mmmmmm...

[cosmolinguist]

The list seemed a bit Cities-centric--something the rest of the state should be used to by now, as everything about Minnesota seems that way. :-) Or maybe that's just because making fun of them is the one thing the rest of the state has in common.

And oh, Seth, you tempt me so. I am, in fact, wearing my Little Angie's t-shirt now and think some of those chicken fajitas would be great. So careful what you promise, or I'll hold you to it. :-)

[setharoo.livejournal.com]

Yes, it does seem like--to those in the Cities...for some reason people like Erin comes to mind--northern Minnesota is merely the place "where they go up to the cabin" and southern Minnesota is on the same mental wavelength as Iowa. (Thus, the term "Iowegian"...)

And we still need to ride the Pizza Train as well!

[cosmolinguist]

Ah yes, I remember that. Oh, the promises you made when we were freshmen! :-)

[setharoo.livejournal.com]

Yeah--and, as I recall, we need to get greenflower on this. I don't think she's ever been to Duluth.

[cosmolinguist]

I think she's been there; josh8e went to UMD for a little while.