This was much more typical in 1960 than in 2017.

There is still a small grain of truth here, that perhaps applies to natives in some rural areas of the Deep South, except in Florida, which is a true melting pot.

However, there are plenty of Northern and Midwestern transplants here, who are a bit more typically American. We even (gasp!) (yay!) have many people from all over the friggin' world, right here in High Point! And it is quite hard to find a true native Charlottean. Average residency in Charlotte is about 2.5 years.

The largest BMW plant in the world is in Greer, SC. With some of the cheapest labor in America, Southern states are magnets for rust belt companies who still want to manufacture in America. Boeing has a huge plant in Charleston, SC.

So... The quaint charm of the stereotypical cracker Southern lifestyle is getting harder to notice.

A possum is a flat animal that sleeps in the middle of the road.

There are 5,000 types of snakes and 4,998 of them live in the South.

There are 10,000 types of spiders.. All 10,000 of them live in the South, plus a couple of kinds that no one's seen before.

If it grows, it'll stick ya. If it crawls, it'll bite cha.

Onced and Twiced are words.



Jawl-P? Means, Did you all go to the bathroom?

People actually grow, eat and like okra.

Fixinto is one word. It means I'm going to do that.

There is no such thing as lunch. There is only dinner and then there's supper.

Iced tea is appropriate for all meals and you start drinking it when you're two.
We do like a little tea without sugar. It is referred to as the Wine of the South.

Backwards and forwards means I know everything about you.

The word jeet is actually a question meaning, 'Did you eat?'



You don't PUSH buttons, you MASH em.

Ya'll is singular. All ya'll is plural.

All the festivals across the state are named after a fruit, vegetable, grain, insect, or animal.

You carry jumper cables in your car - for your OWN car.

You only own six spices: salt, pepper, garlic, mustard, Tabasco and ketchup.

The local papers cover national and international news on one page, but require 6 pages for local high school sports, the motor sports, and gossip.

You believe that the first day of deer season is a national holiday.

You know what a hissyfit is.

Fried catfish is the other white meat.

We don't need no dang Driver's Ed. If our mama says we can drive, we can drive!!!

No offense taken. I got a good laugh.

It's just that I've been here 57 years. I've seen a lot of late comers to the party make the mistake of underestimating how smart and shrewd the natives are. I've seen some folks with "way down South out-in-the-sticks" heritage do amazing things, at the very dear expense of outsiders who doubted them or poked fun. "Bless their hearts" is NOT a compliment, believe me!

The formation of Bank of America is a good example. A UNC-CH-educated, ex-marine Southerner from a small town in SC built NC National Bank into NationsBank and then into Bank of America, through mergers and acquisitions. There are many in San Francisco who still wonder what the hell happened to their bank...

My comments were merely meant as a warning to those who would believe the old stereotype of the ignorant Southerner.