YALP!

[gnomi]

[Poll #931328]

Comments

[kuroshii.livejournal.com]

um...people from california don't even say "the i-5"...they just say "the five."

makes for great heckling of TV that supposedly takes place elsewhere!

[gnomi.livejournal.com]

um...people from california don't even say "the i-5"...they just say "the five."

True. I'd forgotten that detail

I'm trying to figure out if it's just California or if this has spread to the rest of the country (well, not our neck of the woods; we say "93" or "route 93" or whatever; there's no "the" in there).

[kuroshii.livejournal.com]

and chicago natives don't use the numbers at all...i55 is "the stevenson," i290 is "the eisenhower," i90/94 is either "the dan ryan" or "the kennedy" depending on whether you're south of the city or north, i355 is "the north-south tollway."

after twelve years here, i still think of them by their numbers but i've learned to translate. ;)

[jencallisto]

it hasn't spread to Minnesota either -- it's definitely just the number, no "the."

having been in California for the last 2 and half years, "the 5" sounds warm and familiar to me. and "the 101" sounds okay in my head. i think i might have difficulty using it for highways that don't exist in California, though, and it doesn't work that well for all of the ones in CA. "the 280," for example, sounds a little weird to me. i dunno.

[cbpotts.livejournal.com]

You left out the proper answer to the last question, which is:

A frickin' heat wave! Woo Hoo, Baby! Let's fire up the BBQ! Hey, what are you doing with a coat on? It's spring!

[gnomi.livejournal.com]

::snerk::

I know people like that. "It's stopped snowing! Let's pull out the grill!"

[farwing.livejournal.com]

I would probably not use the word nicknacks. Becuase chatchkes is such an excellent word. But I would probably spell it with a few more 't's thrown in there.

Also, I don't drive, so I would not be driving on the I-5. And...it looks like I took my wise-ass pills this morning. Plus, I think I ticked the wrong ticky box.

[530nm330hz.livejournal.com]

I'd call the chatchkes tchotchkes, unless someone was around who thinks tchotchke means prostitute, in which case they're stuff. The only time I use the word "knicknack" is as an attributive noun modifying paddywhack.

[530nm330hz.livejournal.com]

And although I voted for knicknack with three k's, even the loosey-goosey NI3 only offers it with four. :-)

[mabfan.livejournal.com]

I voted for four k's, myself. Yay NI3! But what does 11C say? Or AH4?

[kuroshii.livejournal.com]

i usually use the word tchotchkes too. or sometimes "bric-a-brac."

or when i'm feeling frustrated looking at my bookshelves, "clutter."

[greenlily.livejournal.com]

Those little things on the shelf that are annoying to dust, are "tzutzkes" (approximate spelling of a pronunciation which, as far as I can tell, is limited to bilingual English/Yiddish speakers from Dorchester such as my grandmother and my dad, who both have significant tzutzke collections). All the kids I met at Brandeis, most of whom were from either tri-state or California, called them "tchotchkes" despite not owning any, which leads me to think they learned the word from their grandmothers and dads. Hope this helps.

[zsero.livejournal.com]

I say tzatzkes, but to me the word doesn't mean curios and souvenirs, it means toys. As in what children play with. Heyb oof di alle tzatzkes - "pick up all the toys".

[mamadeb.livejournal.com]

I call tchachkes tchachkes. Knicknacks go with paddywacks, in my view.

And it's positively *balmy* out, isn't it?

[kradical.livejournal.com]

As stated above, you left out "the 5," which is how all numbered routes are referred to in California. It seems to be a CA only phenomenon.

As with Chicago, New Yorkers never refer to any of the highways inside New York City by their route numbers. However, they will sometimes refer to them by route number outside the city. For example, it will sometimes be called 95 when it's the Connecticut Turnpike or the New Jersey Turnpike, but it's always the Cross Bronx and the Bruckner when it's inside NYC. Ditto 87 -- the New York State Thruway is 87, but the Major Deegan is the Major Deegan. And so on.

[quarkwiz.livejournal.com]

I was baffled when my visiting California cousin referred to 'Route 25' (and earlier, when we lived in Toronto, 'Route 2,' known to us as either the Gardiner or Lakeshore Blvd, depending what bit you were on). I'd had no idea Queens Boulevard had a route number till then.

Why do the signs all say 'Southern Parkway,' but everyone I know calls it the 'Southern State'? That's been a NY mystery to me for awhile.

[kuroshii.livejournal.com]

i believe the full names are technically Southern State Parkway and Northern State Parkway. i guess the signmakers dropped off the "state" for being redundant, whereas native speakers drop off the redundant "parkway" cuz it's got more syllables? (or maybe we keep the state so northern state doesn't get confused with northern boulevard?) dunno.

i thought 25 was hillside/jamaica ave when it's in queens. i keep getting those mixed up: most of my NY driving was in nassau. i know 25 is jericho turnpike once it crosses into nassau.

[quarkwiz.livejournal.com]

You got me curious, so I pulled out a map. It's an older Hagstrom map, so it's hard to read (ugh), but it looks like Queens Blvd has the 25 designation till somewhere in Kew Gardens, and then it's Hillside/Jamaica. After that, it wanders around some more. Looks like whatever road is biggest as it heads farther east, that's the one that gets the number. But as I said, I had no idea about the numbers till my outtatowner cousin said something! Far better to go by street names within the city, IMHO.

[kuroshii.livejournal.com]

yeah i poked around on mapquest after i posted that. and right at the border, suddenly there's segments of Bs to contend with as well! till they all merge.

i don't know anyone that refers to northern boulevard as 25a, either: i only managed to learn that's what it was 'cuz i was on it so darn much and there are those little white signs after almost every streetlight. i'm totally with you on using names instead of numbers for the "little" streets like these. well, compared to interstates they're little. who the hell calls the L.I.E. "495" anyway?! ans: tourists!

poking around mapquest, it's amazing (and scary) what details have gotten pushed to the far corners of my mind (i don't want to admit "forgotten!") in the twelve years i've been away.

[kradical.livejournal.com]

I believe the full name is the Southern State Parkway. It's also possible that it's one of those 6th Avenue/Avenue of the Americas cases where nobody calls it by its real name......

[saxikath]

I said I was from the west but not California because that's where I grew up. But linguistically I'm increasingly a west/midwest/New England mashup.

[theodosia.livejournal.com]

Faced with having to spell knickknack correctly, I'd go with "gewgaw."

[mabfan.livejournal.com]

How is that pronounced? "Goo-gaw or Joo-Jaw"? Or some combination thereof?

[kuroshii.livejournal.com]

i've always pronounced it "giw" like in "ewww!" but yeah, hard G.

[lonfiction.livejournal.com]

bric-a-brac man myself. Or more commonly "all that junk up there collecting dust"

Neither of which was an option. :) knick-knack looks right too, though.

I just call interstates by their number, sans "the". Though I never lived out west or in California, so I must have picked that up in the Philippines...which was full of Californians when I lived there (but not interstates.)


If you cannot wear shorts and a tee-shirt comfortably, then it's too darn cold.

[sorek.livejournal.com]

I've just been outside for the first time today. I'd like to change my vote from "Warm compared to the 12 it was yesterday" to "Please sir, may I have some more?"

::sighs contently::

[lisafeld.livejournal.com]

I use knick-knacks...

[elul-3.livejournal.com]

I said "the i-5" because it was the closest to "the five" and when in Rome....but for any Ineate outside of California, there's no "the."