Talk Like a Philadelphian

In response to my friend Chris Pence's posting about how to tell someone is from Western Pennsylvania I decided to show him how those on the eastern side of the commonwealth speak. I also want him to notice that I am using a song lyric as the title of this posting.
(When I was in 2nd grade I remember hearing a song on Eagle 106 that was sung to the tune of "Walk Like an Egyptian" but it replaced the lyrics with "Talk like a Philadelphian".)

In southeastern Pennsylvania you do not have a Grandma and Grandpa. You have a Grandmom and a Grandpop and will be pronounced either "granmom and granpop" or "grammom and grampop". Mine are "Grammom and Grampop". If you do not call your grandparents by these names you call them Mom Mom (pronounced Mum Mum) and Pop Pop.

We wash our clothes. We do not warsh them. When we wash them we use water (pronounced "wooder"). In the summer we enjoy Water Ice and that is pronounced "wooder ice". Because my mom is from Iowa, I never took to saying "wooder" but I will say "wooder ice".

We drink soda. We may even use a "strawl".

Women wear "brawls". A child will "drawl" a "pitcher" (not a picture) with a "crown" instead of a crayon. We eat strawlberries and drink melk.

When you are having steaks for dinner we know it is a steak sandwich. When you go out for steaks we know you are going to a steak house for a steak sandwich too. If you, however, have steak for dinner we know it is a T-bone. The same is true if you are going to a steak house for steak. BUT if you are going to a steak house for a steak then it is a sandwich. It is also assumed that your steak will have cheese on it. Sometimes you will get a mushroom steak or a chicken steak or a pizza steak. If your steak becomes a hoagie only then is it referred to as a cheese steak by calling it a "Cheese Steak Hoagie". We also eat hoagies not subs. A submarine goes under water. They are not sandwiches. That reminds me! We tend to eat samwiches but I think that is common everywhere in the US.

When we say "Mountain" the "t" is implied not pronounced. This is done by keeping the back of your tongue high in the back of your mouth when you say the word. You never touch your teeth with your tongue when there is a "t" in the middle of a word or the end. Other examples of this are "Letter" or "Matt". It almost sounds like a very soft "K" sound... you just don't follow through on making that noise. That makes sense, right?

A group of people is addressed as "Youse guys" not just "youse". It is "youse guys".

Groceries go in bags.

"Root" rhymes with "Route" and has the same "O" sound as "Moon".

The state insect is the "lightning bug". It's not the firefly. And again, the "t" is implied.