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Regional words that you thought everyone used.

498 replies

WhatsGoodForTheGoose · 04/09/2020 18:50

A friend mentioned her winterdyke to me recently and was amazed that I had no idea what it was. It seems that it's what I'd call a clothes horse or airer. I'm from Glasgow and she's from Ayrshire. She said that she thought everyone called it that.

Are there any words that you use and assumed that everyone knew but it turns out that they don't?

OP posts:
Tobydogrocks · 06/09/2020 00:17

East Yorkshire here. When my southern DH first moved up here he was rather confused by the different regional terms and I couldn’t believe that he’d never heard them before, I thought everybody said them Grin

10 foot - Alley way
Bairn - Child
Sand shoes or sannies - Pe shoes
Bread cake - Bread roll/bap
Goodies - Sweets
Tippletail - Forward roll
Taffled - Tangled

BashfulClam · 06/09/2020 00:17

@WhatsGoodForTheGoose

A friend mentioned her winterdyke to me recently and was amazed that I had no idea what it was. It seems that it's what I'd call a clothes horse or airer. I'm from Glasgow and she's from Ayrshire. She said that she thought everyone called it that.

Are there any words that you use and assumed that everyone knew but it turns out that they don't?

Ayrshire born and bred with Ayrshire parents and grandparents and have never heard of a winterdyke????

I was confused when my friend from Airdrie called her sink draining board a ‘bunker’.

shinynewapple2020 · 06/09/2020 00:27

@LioneIRichTea The Wrekin is kind of a place . It's a hill in Shropshire . Hence the expression in the Midlands

JeffVaderneedsatray · 06/09/2020 00:37

I totally confused the dialect quiz thing.
I used to be a teacher and once had a parent come into complain that I had taught her child to swear........
The word I had used was blethering......... As in Will you stop blethering!
I have lived in quite a few places so have picked up a few variations.
Parents from Essex and Midlands, formative years on the East Coast of Scotland, teenage years in the Fens, University in Newwcastle Upon Tyne, taught in Sunderland for a while then Suffolk and now Lincolnshire. DH is from Cumbria.
Am a bit of a linguistic chameleon as well - if I like the sound of a word I adopt it!
I wore sandshoes when I was at school but the kids I work with now wear plimsoles so that's what I call them.
I use bread rolls
I use mardy
I also use mizzle for drizzle, use dreich for a miserable day.
If I am really cross with someone they might be told to "Haddaway and shite man!"
I talk about things being a right clarty mess if they are dirty.

Language is fascinating.

Inthebackoftheimpala · 06/09/2020 00:47

Hold your whist - shut your mouth
Gravy Rings - Donuts with hole in the middle
Childer/wain - Children
Packling/hockling - walking awkwardly
Windees- windows
Rage - tell off
Loanin - Lane
Plantan - wooded area
Peice - packed lunch
Just some brains shut off for the night. DS has the strongest Scottish accent ever, especially since he's never set foot in the country.

WingingWonder · 06/09/2020 00:47

Nesh
Mardy
All around the Wrekin
Cwytch
How come

AndNoneForGretchenWieners · 06/09/2020 00:55

Batches
Entry (what other folk call an alley or a ginnel)
Islands for roundabouts
Mardy
Snap
Daps
Yampy
Tip tops

DH used to say 'gis a suck' which caused much consternation with my family. He meant 'pass me a boiled sweet' Grin

AndNoneForGretchenWieners · 06/09/2020 00:58

also the word 'scram' (as in 'that bastard cat just gave me a scram') - i thought it was what everyone called it, but it turns out it's not a local word and my Welsh grandparents imported it when they moved to the Midlands!

Newgirl20 · 06/09/2020 02:43

Alot of people in my area use 'eyup ducky'

WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll · 06/09/2020 02:54

This is a marvellous thread!

“Actually, a contender for the worst one. Jobbie. I know that as a juvenile word for poo, shouted across a playground or by drunk people "yah jobbie!!" Unfortunately quite a few senior people in my work use it as a word for "small task". I have to stifle a snigger every time...”*

Oh, that would just be non-stop hilarity! I love the idea of the CEO’s answering machine message saying snootily “I’m afraid I can’t come to the phone right now as I’m just in the middle of doing a little jobbie” Grin

And yes, I've had my literacy questioned after using the word outwith. I feel vindicated!!

It’s a perfectly normal Scots word, albeit not known further south. Does anybody remember the old hymn ‘There is a green hill far away, without a city wall’? That’s basically the same usage (but with the syllables swapped around) – it doesn’t mean that the hill doesn’t have a city wall (why would it?), but that it is outside of the city wall.

Other Scots/Weegie favourites of mine are greetin’ (crying), we’en (child = ‘wee one’) and puggy (pub fruit machine).

You're right ."Ar bay" is I'm not.

The other Black Countryism that causes similar confusion is the omission of the ‘n’t’ from the end of don’t, pronouncing it like ‘doe’ (as in deer). Slightly confusing when spoken, but completely baffling when some will then go on to write it as ‘do’, making it apparently mean the exact opposite – “I do like it” meaning “I DO NOT like it”. I heard one BC comedian once say that the singer Dido is known locally as ‘Diane: stop it!’ Grin

Cock as a term of affection, apparently this isn’t really a thing outside of the Black Country

Jasper Carrot once did a rather silly (but still very funny) routine about him smuggling a counterfeit ‘designer’ watch home that he’d bought from a dodgy market stall whilst on holiday, by wearing it on his, erm, gentleman’s appendage. He then bumped into an old friend at airport security who panicked him by asking loudly “Jasper, me old mate – hey, 'ave yer got the time on yer, cock?” Grin

The East Midlands (Nottingham) dialect sadly underrated I think - and no actor on earth can do the accent apart from Vicky McClure and Su Pollard.

Don’t forget also the wonderful Lauren Socha. Granted she doesn't have the best ever name for a premium brand of cooking fat, though Grin

‘Trump’ meaning fart is another one that doesn’t seem restricted to just one locality, but is far more commonly used and understood in the North and Midlands. A surprising number of British people have never encountered it, even though it’s basically just an abbreviation of ‘trumpet’, and hilarity ensues when they only know it as a term in Bridge! When DJT became the US President, he was very proud of his name as, to them, 'The Trump' means ‘the Ace’, ‘the Boss’, ‘Top Dog’ etc. and a lot of his fans were horrified that Brits had chosen to grossly disrespect and insult him by ‘inventing’ a ‘new’ meaning of his name to mean something vulgar, as had previously happened domestically with Rick Santorum. Nope – we had been trumping for a very long time, long before The Donald was even born Grin

Quirrelsotherface · 06/09/2020 06:57

while = until - "he isn't back while lunchtime"

My IL's are from Yorkshire and MIL always tells me she'll be working 9 while 4 Grin
It still takes me a minute to decipher what she's actually telling me

Mustardbay · 06/09/2020 07:00

Femma meaning flimsy or weak is the best word I've learned moving around. I use it all the time now, even though no one knows what I mean.

snowone · 06/09/2020 07:21

I once asked my southern friend if they wanted a brew.....they had no idea! 🙈

Also I would call a bread roll a tea cake......it has caused me several issues over the years as I HATE raisins! 🤢

LittleBearPad · 06/09/2020 08:37

@PepperMooMoo

Squinny! Din! Yo' Alright?

Anyone from my neck of the woods?!

I definitely use squinny though not Dinlo - they seem to be pretty specific to the naval city I grew up near.

DH is from the midlands and so I’ve picked up other terms - twitchel being one. However where I’d use claggy he’d use clarty. Clarty can also be used for a cake or pudding that’s not light and sticks to the top of your mouth or your ribs as my mother would say.

emilybrontescorsett · 06/09/2020 08:46

We always use trump as a far more polite word for fart.
A bread cake is a bread roll. A cake is a large sponge that serves at least 6 people. The individual version is a bun. However we never say bread bun because a bun is sweet.

tearinyourhand · 06/09/2020 08:56

I used to be a teacher and once had a parent come into complain that I had taught her child to swear........
The word I had used was blethering......... As in Will you stop blethering!

What did the parent think it meant?

tearinyourhand · 06/09/2020 08:59

@Inthebackoftheimpala

Hold your whist - shut your mouth Gravy Rings - Donuts with hole in the middle Childer/wain - Children Packling/hockling - walking awkwardly Windees- windows Rage - tell off Loanin - Lane Plantan - wooded area Peice - packed lunch Just some brains shut off for the night. DS has the strongest Scottish accent ever, especially since he's never set foot in the country.
Co Antrim by any chance?
Redlion98 · 06/09/2020 09:01

A woodlouse was always a cheese hog for me!

TrickyD · 06/09/2020 09:06

while = until - "he isn't back while lunchtime"

I read somewhere that the level crossing sign ‘Do not cross while lights are flashing’ had some dutiful people waiting until the lights flashed, then presumably making a dash for it.

Badabingbadabum · 06/09/2020 09:07

I am always genuinely amazed that island/ roundabout are not interchangeable across the whole of the uk! "Take the first exit at the island". It even looks like an island!

It was only very recently I found out that forward rolls aren't universally known as gambols as well.

I moved to Bristol for a few years and loved that they call playground slides sliders!

CaptainMyCaptain · 06/09/2020 09:14

@Newgirl20

Alot of people in my area use 'eyup ducky'
Same here but I think its dying out. It was more common 30 years ago when I moved here.
hellsbellswithcherryontop · 06/09/2020 09:19

fettle-to fix something, it just needs a good fettling

CaptainMyCaptain · 06/09/2020 09:32

That drawer where you keep what I call 'odds and sods ' (probably a London expression) DH calls the 'rammel drawer'. (Sheffield)

hellsbellswithcherryontop · 06/09/2020 09:37

don't know if it's just local to where I grew up but a brew can be a small stream

Antirrhinum · 06/09/2020 09:46

@Mustardbay

Femma meaning flimsy or weak is the best word I've learned moving around. I use it all the time now, even though no one knows what I mean.

We use femma with that meaning in the NE Mustard.

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