Popping up and popping down

[TweetUsOnFacebook]

I say 'I'm popping up to Tesco' as its North of our house.

But Dh says 'I'm popping down to Tesco'. It messes with my head as I think 'down' should mean South.

Aibu to think you need to either pop up or pop down depending on the direction of the destination? Obviously that would become complicated in an East/West scenario but in that case 'I'm popping to..' would do.

I know 'popping' is annoying but it's how we talk. It even annoys me as I'm saying it, but I can't stop.

Vote Yes: You pop out to the direction of the destination, so Northerly is pop up. Southerly is pop down.

Vote No: It doesn't matter and it's unreasonable to say 'popping'.

Popping down to Tesco.
Popping into Cambridge nb actually impossible to pop to due to congestion.

Gern up Narj = going to Norwich in a Norfolk accent

I think it doesn’t matter if you’re popping up or down but have no problem with popping so am not sure how to vote. Help!

After a lot of thought, I would use up/down only as a descriptor of into and out of the town centre from our house - so I pop down the town, pop up to CoOp (actually the other side of the town from us), and pop up to the farm shop (in 3 directions out of town).
I'd never thought about it, it was just what my dad said I think, and he'd barely been to London or a big city in his entire life

I always ' pop to' without any use of direction. People around here say they're going up to London (well at least pre- covid they did!) but London is most definitely South of here.
MIL lives about a mile from BIL. She refers to them as the 'down the roads' to distinguish between other BIL's family who live elsewhere. I'm not really sure why they are 'down' the road as you go up and down and then up again to get to them. And they are slightly North of her house.

I once got in a huge argument about similar at primary school.

My friend once said (we were 9) “I’m going down to Nottingham!”

Only we were in Exeter - and I remember shouting “no, you are going UP to Nottingham!” and we argued while queuing for school dinners. Got in so much trouble for it...

I would say it was 'popping to' if I used the expression myself

I tend to nip rather than pop, with no directional component. Parents always used to talk of "going/popping/nipping/etc up the road" though, to mean going to the local shops, which were to the east of our house.

Thinking about it, I do tend to get an 'up' in there if I'm complaining about having to "go up big Tesco's" (which is south) but would "go down old town" (even further south). Rhyming, alliteration and mouthfeel may have something to do with this.

To add confusion, in my family we say below and above to refer to the direction of wherever we're referring to is. Tomorrow afternoon I'll be below in town or above at the butchers etc. I'm not sure we are that hot on making sure we use the right word to indicate the direction of the place but thinking about it now they do so seem to be roughly right (the butchers is north of the house etc).

It's popping out to tesco here or popping round to the corner shop! Sometimes popping up the road to the petrol station. So many variations.

When we lived in Singapore I would always say I was flying "down to Sydney" but never "up to London" so you're making me wonder now OP....

Interesting. I think I generally work on the basis of going up for north and down for south. So as I live in London I talk about going up to Manchester and down to Brighton. However I also refer to going up to town - by which I mean going to the centre of town/west end. Makes no sense and is completely inconsistent.

I also go "up to London" (live in Brighton) but when I lived in Croydon I just went "into London".

I used to live in Southwark, but now about 30 miles from the centre of London, but in both cases I'd say "I'm going to town" to mean going into central London. I don't do much popping, to be honest.

For us, popping up means to go to somewhere residential, popping down means to go somewhere commercial. It has nothing to do with the actual direction you travel.

E.g, "Just going to pop up to my mum's and see how she is", vs "Just going to pop down the Asda to get some milk".

My town is on a hill so the direction of the pop is in relation to up or down the hill. 'Heading out' is used for further afield.

No, no, no. You're both wrong. You should pop out to Tesco.

We say down but geographically speaking it should be up lol

Whenever DH mentions a place, even if it’s hundreds of miles away he gesticulates with his head. Of course there’s no way of knowing if he’s doing it in the right direction most of the time.

@bridgetreilly

No, no, no. You're both wrong. You should pop out to Tesco.

no no no , its popping in to tescos

I don't pop, I nip

=

In our house we would just say “I’m popping to Tesco”.

I would say down or up appropriately if where I was going was far enough away for me to know whether it was north or south of me, so basically if it were in a different part of the country. With places like the supermarket I would have absolutely no idea.

My understanding is that you always go UP to the centre. E.g. You always go up to the capital wherever you're travelling from.
So if Tesco is more in the centre of where you live you'd pop up.

Yes, my understanding has always been that it is geographical except where the capital is concerned. So wherever you live in the UK you pop UP to London but for any other destination the up/down depends on whether it is North/South of you.

I have not heard that applied to centres generally. I would not talk about popping up to the town centre. I would pop IN to the town centres. Going in to a centre makes more logical sense than going up to it.

In the northern hemisphere, "up" should be south, towards the equator, and "down" should be north towards the pole. This should be reversed in the southern hemisphere, and there is nothing confusing at all about this theory

@TweetUsOnFacebook

'Out' gets used to signify the destination is further away. 'I'm driving out to Aldi'

Where are you from, OP? This up/down/driving out sounds like a regional variant I haven’t heard before.

“I’m just popping out (or over) to Tesco,” for me.

And I go “into” town, not up or down to it.

Where we live everything is 'around the corner'. There are loads of bloody corners! But it's confusing when you're trying to describe where something is!