Provosims

Where I choose to live, as with most places I’ve ever chosen to live, we have our own fair share of eccentricities.  Cultural, political, religious – I fully embrace all of them, and think that to a large degree our “imperfections” are what make us interesting, engaging, and human.  But language is my favorite local oddity, especially because of how varied it has been from town to town. 

Here I have compiled a list of local words, gleaned from actual conversations, of words I hear (or use) on a regular basis that I think are funny.  (The “usage” sentences are altered to protect the innocent.)

•  “arready”: (already)  Usage:  “Dang, BYU arready lost seven games!” 

• “mmmm-bye!”:  (goodbye)  The “mmm” varies in length, depending on social status and the degree of insincerity involved in the farewell.  Usage:  “Uh-huh… O.K.!... Mmmmmmmmmm-Bye!” 
• "ecpecially” or “ek-specially”: (especially)  Usage:  “I like all there players, ecspecially Bronco Rugercolt!”
• “pichure”: (picture)  Usage:  “I got a pichure of Bronco on my wall at home!”“tempachure”:  (temperature)  Usage:  “She’s got a tempachure, so I gave her some Coke.”  
• “melk”: (milk)  Usage:  “The Coke didn’t help, so I gave her some melk."
•  “maaanaise” (mayonnaise)  Usage:  “Slather a sum’more maaanaise on there, will ya?  More.  More.  A little more.  That’s good.” 
• “pellow”:  (pillow)  Usage:  “My pellow got Coke spilled on it; I’m headed to Cos’co for a new one.”
•  “sell”:  (sale)  Usage:  “You like that?  Picked that puppy up at a garage sell down the street!” 
• “acrosst”: (across)  Usage:  “No, not that garage sell.  Acrosst the street.” 
• “dill”:  (deal)  Usage:  “They’re out? What’s the dill?” 
• “probly”  or “provly”:  (probably)  Usage:  “They’re probly gonna run it a lot, Utah has a heck of a defense this year.” 
• “fal”:  (foul)  Usage:  “This maaanaise must be expired.  It’s totally fal.” 
• “moun’ins”:  (mountains, or any word with an “nt” combination in it)  Usage:  “I live in the shadow of the moun’ins in the valley of the everlasting hills!” 
• “Evingston”:  (Evanston)  Usage:  “Yeah, gonna run up to Evingston to buy parts for my Pontiac.” 
• “whole nother”:  (another)  Usage:  “Oh, you’re talking about their 2007 season?  That’s a whole nother dill.”
•  “supposively”:  (supposedly)  Usage:  “Yeah, supposively these three huge guys just appeared out of nowhere and cleaned, butchered and jerked the whole deer!” 
• “bolth”:  (both)  Usage:  “Black or Pinto beans?… I’ll just have bolth.”
•  “Is what we’re gonna do is…”:  (What we’re going to do is…)  Usage:  “Is what we’re gonna do is stop at Old Navy and buy thirty-seven matching blue t-shirts!” 
• “figger”: (figure)  Usage:  “Dag-nab it!  Lost to Florida? How do you figger that happened?”
•  “mel”: (meal)  Usage:  “Welcome to Café Rio! Enjoy your mel!”
•  “olny”: (only)  Usage:  “What the crap?  They olny gave me one thing of salad dressing!” 
• “trells”: (trails)  Usage:  “Oooh, take your moun’in bike.  St. George has some awesome trells.”
• “then”: (than)  Usage:  “No way, BYU totally has a better English program then Utah State.”
•  “lussin”: (listen)  Usage:  “Lussin, you don’t even know what your saying!” 
• “offen” or “offenthenot”: (often)  Usage:  “Shur, I shop Cos’co pretty offen!” alt: “…more offenthenot!” 
• “shur”: (sure)  Usage:  “Hand out free BYU mini-footballs?  Shur thing!”
• “eltz”: (else)  Usage:  “Me, wearing a red shirt?  Must have been somebody eltz.”

Honorable mentions:  Enyways (anyway), pacifically (specifically), excape/ekscape (escape), nutten (nothing), supposably (supposedly), all most (almost), and zak-ely (exactly).