Wednesday, March 15, 2006

Texas Dictionary

While I live in Dallas, sadly I will admit that I do not really have an accent at all. However, I work with several "real" Texans. A co-worker of mine (from NE Texas, near Texarkana) shared a book with me, The Illustrated Texas Dictionary of the English Language, to help me to understand him. I thought I might share a few, they were pretty funny...

yew- used to refer to the one or ones being addressed
"Yore one of them girls, ain't yew?"
warsh- to cleanse by running or scrubbin in water
"Pardon me, ah'm gonna warsh mah hands."
all - petroleum
"They found all on mah land!"
doll - the process used to operate a telephone.
" Why that's alot of numbers to doll long distance!"
banes- large, smooth kidney shaped, edible seeds.
"Ah could eat mah weight in pinto banes."
slave- the part of a garment covering an arm only.
"Are you saying mah left slave is shorter than my right slave?"
paypal- no, not the way to pay on ebay, this is a body of persons.
"Where'd all them paypal come from?"
kaint- contraction for "can not"
"Stop it! Yew kaint do it that way!"
sep - to obmit or bar.
"Everyone can go sep yew!"
are- sixty minutes
"Ah'll meet yew there in about an are."
kwat - free from noise or disturbance.
"Be kwat; yawl are makin' too much noise!"
and last but definitely not least...
bear - a fermented liquor brewed from malt and flavored with hops.
"All ah had was one bottle of bear."

What can I say but God Bless TEXAS!

1 comment:

Amstaff Mom said...

yeppers! It's true! I've heard all of them.