Are there any regional words which you use and didn’t realise that not everyone else does?

[FormerCarer]

Inspired by a conversation with friends from different areas who assumed that everyone used mardy and mithering. It’s making me question now which words I assume are universal and really aren’t.

I moved about 50 miles away from where I was brought up, same county. There, a teacake always had currants in it, as in a toasted teacake, the plain version was a bread cake. Here a teacake is a bread cake and the fruited version is a currant teacake. Caused me some confusion in the chippy when I was offered a teacake with fish and chips.

You're from the same place as me! Cruckled is a far better word than saying 'I twisted my ankle.'

I remember being on the bus with my DS when he was about four or five. An old lady got on the bus and said to me ‘ah he’s a bonny lad, you couldn’t bray him’. My son asked me ‘what does bray mean Mammy?’😂My late DM’s ultimate compliment was to say someone was ‘nipping clean’ meaning a good and efficient housewife. I like the word oxters for armpits. I always ask my dog groomer to go canny on the dog’s oxters. Although I guess it’s more leg pits for a dog.

In Lancashire having a get together when everyone brings something to share it's called a "Jacob's Join". In Lincolnshire it's called a "Pot Luck Supper".

See also: squint meaning crooked, wonky etc.

Parents are northerners but I grew up in the south so often used words that nobody understood. Mithering, worriting, waiting for the tea to mash, keep your nebbie out. Summat. Now then. And so on.

Slater (wood louse)
Whirly gig (outside clothes airer)
Clothes horse (inside clothes airer)
Scullery (kitchen)
Bunker (kitchen worktop/counter)
Wheesht (shh)
Dreich (grey, damp, miserable weather)

West of Scotland (if it wasn’t obvious!)

Back along is regional? Didn't realise that one.

Where's it to? - where is it?
Jasper - wasp (or wops.)
Emmet - ant (cf Cornish tourists)
Emmet butt - ant hill
Grockle - tourism
Gurt - big (often used double, as In "thst gurt big thing".)
Coombe - valley
Shrammed/shramming - cold, piercing weather, the sort that goes right through you. A shramming wind, I was shrammed out there.

I only remember plimsolls at school, but our Welsh friend had daps.

I discovered most of these were Dorset when I was at uni. You can also use be as the present tense for all persons - i be, you be, he/she/it be, we be, you be, they be. I also remember some of the farm workers gendering nous, "I reckon she be down there," for, "I think that is where you will find it," when trying to find a leaking pipe under a field. And -ing suffices often lose the g "goin' to town" "sewen a hole in my shirt." Also bin, not been.

I also discovered lardy cake is regional when I was at work in Berkshire and they did not know of it.

There's probably loads more i use without thinking about it.

My friend used to say "my head's a shed. Also"I can eat 2 potatoes more than a pig"

Twitchell - narrow walkway like a ginnel

First person I’ve met as an adult who also knows ‘coopie down’!

Also a daps wearer.

I’ll raise you ‘emping down’ for raining really hard.

It was only recently that I found out that “cotters” (meaning knots in your hair) was a dialect word. From Hartlepool. My mum was from there but I grew up in the south west.

Cornish with a Scots granny and some time in the Army;
Dreckly (directly) does NOT mean immediately,
Scat - hit.
Scat un a heller - hit him extremely hard.
Teasy / Teasy as n'adder - Irritable / very Irritable.
Crib - mid morning snack.
'er no - or not
Gwine pub er no? - Going to the pub or not?
Madder do 'ee? - Is it important?
Madder do 'ee fuck - not remotely.
Stank - walk
Chackin' - thirsty
Wossonwithee - What's up with you?
Some - an intensifier, eg some pretty girl or you're some boy to a bloke giving it the tough guy.
'Ere minute - come over here please.
Knawdundidee - Did you know him?
Aren't - Am not, eg I aren't stanking up there

My use of ginnel and mashing both baffled people when I got to university!

Mine is also mardy.

I lived in Yorkshire for a bit and someone asked me where the ‘breadcakes’ were in the shop and i had no idea what they meant. Bread roll apparently.

Mine is also mardy.

I lived in Yorkshire for a bit and someone asked me where the ‘breadcakes’ were in the shop and i had no idea what they meant. Bread roll apparently.

Same as pps:

Skelf, fish supper, oxters, oose, wains, slaters, stoor

And also:
Chuckies (little stones)
Breeks (trousers)
Greet (cry)
A piece (sandwich)
Sannies (plimsolls?)
Drookit (soaking wet)

Is squint/ squinty a regional word?? I had no idea!

We had coopie down in Dorset, too. Mostly from my mother when we were on some walk. "Mum, I need the loo!" "Just coopie down behind that tree, then "

My dad calls trainers daps, he’s N Irish. Other classics are a ‘piece’ meaning a sandwich without a top slice. Dreek, meaning grey and cold weather, mibby as in maybe, hursel, as in frog in the throat. Slatey is a wood lice. Poke of something is a portion.

Cwtch, until I was about 12 I thought everyone used it, not just Welsh people.

Scrow/Scrowy - mess/messy
Lish - full of life
Cap/Capped - surprise/surprised
Ladged/ladgefull - embarrassed/embarrassing
Nebber - nosey
Kessen - stuck or ill
Clicked - starving
Girt - large
Kaisty - fussy eater

Foonered weary
Scunnered fed up

Pp mentioned gambol. Newly arrived in Birmingham, I took DS1 to Tumble Tots and someone told him to do a gambol. We both looked blank! Forward roll.

I soon picked up a few local phrases from my pupils. "He's wagging it,Miss" led to further enquiries as to his whereabouts. "He's blazin' my mom!" was an accusation beyond the pale, and "ta ra a bit" was a friendly goodbye (widely used).

In Yorkshire 'while' can have a different meaning which sometimes leads to confusion.

Another -"clapping the dug"

Like smoothing the cat, but with dogs

The word 'gay' or 'fair' are also used in a traditional way as adverbs in front of most of these in the same way most people would use 'very' or 'quite'now

I.e

the lamb was gay lish
It was fair scrowy like
She's fair clicked up
I was fair capped
He was gay ladged