15 Alabama Sayings That Leave Out-of-Towners Completely Lost

Drop a Michigan transplant into a Cullman diner and watch their confusion kick in.

These are the Alabama sayings that leave out-of-towners completely lost.

1. Roll Tide

Roll Tide isn’t only a football cheer in Alabama, and that’s where outsiders get lost.

It’s a hello. It’s a goodbye. It’s sympathy at a funeral and a nod to a stranger in the Piggly Wiggly checkout line.

Tell a Tuscaloosa mechanic your car broke down, and he might answer, “Roll Tide,” meaning hang in there.

Auburn folks have their own version, and they’ll holler “War Eagle” back at you with the same all-purpose shrug.

Two words, every occasion.

Mix the two crowds up at the Iron Bowl, though, and you’ll learn fast which side of the state you’re standing on.

2. Buggy

In Alabama, you don’t push a shopping cart through the store.

You push a buggy.

Grab a buggy, dodge the buggy with the wobbly wheel, and mind the kid standing up in the buggy.

The word throws newcomers every time, since a buggy sounds like something a horse ought to be pulling.

Alabamians settled the matter long ago.

To them it’s always been a buggy, and the plastic cart at the Piggly Wiggly is no exception.

3. Fixin’ To

Fixin’ to is how Alabamians tell you something’s about to happen.

Nobody’s repairing anything.

“I’m fixin’ to head to Gulf Shores” means the bags are almost in the truck.

It sets up the near future, the way other folks say “about to.”

Here’s the catch outsiders miss: Fixin’ to can stretch from five minutes to an hour, depending on who’s talking.

A cousin fixin’ to leave your cookout might still be on the porch at sundown.

4. Bless Your Heart

Bless your heart sounds like the sweetest thing an Alabamian can say to you.

Sometimes it is.

Say it to a crying child or a friend with the flu, and it’s pure comfort.

But drop it after somebody does something foolish, and the meaning flips.

“She locked her keys in the running car again, bless her heart” is no compliment.

Tone tells you everything.

Newcomers take it as kindness and miss the dagger tucked underneath.

5. Might Could

Might could is the kind of grammar that makes English teachers twitch, and Alabamians use it without blinking.

It stacks two helper words where the rulebook allows one.

“I might could make it Saturday” means maybe, with a lean toward yes.

Linguists call it a double modal, and it turns up across the Deep South.

To a newcomer, it sounds like a typo read out loud.

It isn’t.

It leaves you an out, since “I might could” promises less than a flat “I will.”

6. Coke

Order a Coke in Alabama, and the next question catches tourists flat.

“What kind?”

In Alabama, Coke doesn’t only mean the red can. It’s the catch-all word for any soft drink.

A Coke might turn out to be a Sprite, a Dr Pepper, or an orange Fanta.

So a mom asking four kids what Coke they want could come home with four different bottles.

It confuses the daylights out of anybody raised saying “pop” or “soda.”

7. Toboggan

A toboggan in Alabama goes on your head, not down a snowy hill.

It’s the knit winter hat other folks call a beanie or a stocking cap.

“Grab your toboggan, it’s cold” has nothing to do with sledding.

No hills required.

That trips up Northerners hard, since they grew up calling a long wooden sled a toboggan.

Down along Mobile Bay, snow’s rare enough that a sled would just gather dust, so the only toboggan worth owning goes on your head.

8. Cut off the Light

Alabamians cut lights on and off instead of turning them.

“Cut off the light when you leave” means flip the switch.

It works on everything, too.

You cut on the TV, cut off the oven, and cut on the air conditioner before a Montgomery July cooks you alive.

Not a blade in sight.

Newcomers pause the first time, half-expecting a pair of scissors to come out.

9. Directly

Directly is one of the sneakiest words Alabamians use because it doesn't mean right now.

It means soon, or after a little while.

"I'll be there directly" tells you to expect them eventually, not this instant.

A visitor from up North hears "directly" and stands by the door, keys in hand.

They'll wait a good while.

Old-timers around Cullman might smear it down to "dreckly," one lazy syllable that means the same thing.

10. Sugar

Ask an Alabama grandmother for some sugar, and she won't reach for the pantry.

She wants a kiss, usually on the cheek.

"Come give me some sugar" is what she says when the kids walk in the door.

It's affection, not baking.

A first-time visitor can stand there puzzled while Grandma taps her cheek and waits.

It's the sweetest request in the state, and there's not a granule of sugar in it.

11. Mash

Alabamians mash buttons instead of pressing them.

"Mash the top one" at the elevator means push it.

You mash the button at the crosswalk, mash send on your phone, and mash the horn when somebody dawdles at a green light on I-65.

Outsiders picture a potato masher and lose the thread.

Wrong kitchen.

The button just needs a push.

12. Fair to Middlin'

Ask an Alabamian how they're doing, and "fair to middlin'" means so-so.

Not great, not terrible.

The phrase comes from grading cotton, where "middling" marked an average bale.

Farmers borrowed it for people, and it stuck.

"How's your mama?" "Oh, fair to middlin'."

It's the answer that says nothing's wrong, and nothing's worth bragging on either.

13. Over Yonder

Over yonder is how Alabamians point without pointing.

It means over there, somewhere in that direction.

"The good fishing's over yonder" could put you a hundred yards or three counties away.

There's no scale to it.

Ask for directions and you might get "just up yonder past the church," with no street name at all.

You learn to read the finger and the chin nod that come with it.

14. Tump

Tump is a word most of the country has never heard, and Alabamians tump things over all the time.

It means to tip or knock something over.

"Don't tump the canoe" on a Coosa River float is solid advice.

Tump a glass of sweet tea, and you've made a mess.

Over it goes.

The word packs "tip" and "dump" into one blunt little syllable.

Say it up North, and you'll get a blank stare every time.

15. Carry

Carry, in Alabama, means to give somebody a ride.

"I'll carry you to the doctor" involves a car, not a stretcher.

You carry your mama to church, carry the kids to school, and carry a friend to the airport in Birmingham.

Nobody's lifting anybody.

It's an old sense of the word that hung on in Alabama long after other places dropped it.