Your STATES! KNOW YOUR STATES!!

[Primer]

"Oh, you lived in Wichita! Did you need a passport? Isn't that in Texas?"

We do have a Wichita FALLS in north Texas somewhere. BrassCowboy could probably tell you better where it is than I could, since I'm over 200 miles away from it (but still only halfway to the other side of the state).

[Gurndigarn]

Well, Little Rock IS in Arkansas. We all know who [what] came out of Arkansas...

Yeah, but it's not fair to blame the entire state for Sam Walton.

[Bella_Vixen]

I never saw that coming!

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Cia, I believe idiots should be allowed to be idiots. That way, the rest of us can see them coming. No way I'm getting into it with a customer over his real or imagined heritage.

[Mighty Girl]

Hmm. Back in school, I distinctly remember that you could pick either history or geography to take- and people thought I was a masochist because I chose both. Excuse me for not wanting to be ignorant.

[Misanthropical]

You should hear the stupidity I get when people find out that I'm fron South Dakota.

I get asked why I don't have a Southern accent.

I get asked if we traveled in covered wagons.

I get asked if we still fight the Indians.

I get asked what it is like coming from a backwards state to such a progressive state. Yeah, PA is soooo progressive! NOT!

I get asked if South Dakota is in the United States.

I usually have to walk away from people because I can't stand the utter stupidity and refuse to answer stupid questions.

[Jester]

You should hear the stupidity I get when people find out that I'm fron South Dakota.

I get asked why I don't have a Southern accent.

I get asked if we traveled in covered wagons.

I get asked what it is like coming from a backwards state to such a progressive state. Yeah, PA is soooo progressive! NOT!

Being from Arizona, I get similar things to the first two.

"Why don't you have an accent?" Oh, y'all think I'ma gonna talk like this? "Yeah?" That's Texas. In Arizona, we KNOW how to f***in' speak!

"Did you grow up with tumbleweeds blowing by your door?" No. While there ARE tumbleweeds in Arizona OUT IN THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE, Phoenix is a major metropolitan area, and actually, at the moment, Phoenix is the sixth largest city in the nation, and quickly closing on Philadelphia for number five. Nitwits.

As for PA, my friend from there described it like this (and I have heard fellow Pennsylvanians describe it similarly): "In the east is Philadelphia, in the west is Pittsburgh, and in between is Alabama!"

[protege]

As for PA, my friend from there described it like this (and I have heard fellow Pennsylvanians describe it similarly): "In the east is Philadelphia, in the west is Pittsburgh, and in between is Alabama!"

I'm from Pittsburgh...and this is *very* true. Of course some of us also think that Alabama exists between Pittsburgh and Erie too

[norrina]

A number of years back, I had just started a new job at a child care center in western North Carolina. I was chatting with one of my new coworkers, and it came about in conversation that I had been raised in Maine.

CW: coworker
Me: yup, ME

CW: Do they speak English in Maine?
Me: *try to come up with witty reparte; suddenly realize she is dead serious* Uhm, yes. Yes, we do. It is our primary language, in fact.
CW: Oh. Well, I wasn't sure, with your accent.
Me: [For the record, I do have a northern accent, but it is not unreasonably strong. I have a good grasp of the English language, and in fact, were I to have my college career to do over, I would most likely graduate as an English major.]

[Cia]

[QUOTE=Misanthropical]

I get asked if we traveled in covered wagons.
Only between Sioux Falls and Rapid otherwise we get to drive Model T's.

I get asked if we still fight the Indians.
We haven't found an arrow in an airplane in 6 months so my guess is no.

I get asked what it is like coming from a backwards state to such a progressive state. Yeah, PA is soooo progressive! NOT!
Well our sign says "Welcome to SD and set your watch back 20 years." PA's says to set it back 40 years. So who's more progressive?

I get asked if South Dakota is in the United States.
No we are a southern Canadian province just like Minnesota.

[MamaMootz]

And....

I'm from NJ and in the process of relocating to CO.

* No, our state is not one big oil refinery.
* No, we don't all live like the Sopranos.
* No, we don't say "youse guys"
* No, our men are not dripping in big gold chains with medallions.
* No, our women don't have big hair.

And finally... if I hear one more person say, "Oh! You're from JOISEY" I swear I'm going to puke. We don't talk like that. Nobody I know says Joisey.

Didn't anybody have those maps when they were kids? The puzzle maps of the U.S. that you had to take apart and put back together and on each state was the capital of that state? That's how I learned my geography of the U.S. and it has stuck with me. Maybe we should buy one of these puzzles for the clueless?

[Bella_Vixen]

And finally... if I hear one more person say, "Oh! You're from JOISEY" I swear I'm going to puke. We don't talk like that. Nobody I know says Joisey.

Becks' future in-laws pronounce it that way. Dad even manages it with a Brooklyn accent.

[Becks]

A LOUD Brooklyn accent, even.

[Mixed Bag]

Jester, I'd love to hear what else the Key West tourists say. (That reminds me of an essay that appeared in a recovery publication where the author said in passing she begrudgingly moved further south because the rest of her family wanted to even though she liked cold weather. It was signed with her partial name and Key West.)

One of my favourite posts on the old board was the call center person who told the caller, when asked, that s/he was in Canada and was asked questions like did they commute by dogsled or some such outlandish stereotypes.

I called 311 in LA city to report a dangerous vehicle in motion. When I said I'd seen it near Wilshire and Sepulveda minutes earlier, more than one operator who was so quick to point out that that was in unincorporated territory (as if they didn't even have to type that major familiar intersection in, perhaps) was mysteriously slow to understand that a half mile in any direction from there was LA city (it's where the big VA hospital and cemetery are, along with all the locally famous federal building protests away from downtown). Maybe if the cellphone had directed me from that parcel to the attorney general instead...?

After working on accounting all night I drove to the home of someone from a company we were working with to drop off the paperwork--he'd told me what city he was in and to drive along a certain main street until I saw blah blah etc. After driving all up and down the main street between the eastern and western city limits I stopped at a phone to say I was lost. He said his street was actually in the less well-known neighboring city but he didn't use that name when giving instructions because no one ever heard of it.

[Geminii]

That's freaky. I'm not even American and though I might not be able to rattle off the entire list of states in ten seconds, I can sure recognise the name of an American state when I hear it.

(Not too great on the postal abbreviations, though. But if I forget whether MI is Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi or Missouri, that's what the internet's for.)

(It's Michigan.)