amusedYou Know You're From Louisiana When... |
The crawdad mounds in your front yard have over taken the grass. You greet people with "Howzyamomma'an'dem?" and hear back "Dey fine!" Every so often, you have waterfront property. When giving directions you use words like "uptown," "downtown," "backatown," "riverside," "lakeside," "other side of the bayou" or "other side of the levee." When you refer to a geographical location "way up North," you are referring to places like Shreveport, Little Rock or Memphis, "where it gets real cold." You've ever had Community Coffee. You can pronounce Tchoupitoulas but can't spell it. You don't worry when you see ships riding higher in the river than the top of your house. You judge a po-boy by the number of napkins used. The waitress at your local sandwich shop tells you a fried oyster po-boy "dressed" is healthier than a Caesar salad. You can eat Popeye's, Haydel's and Zapp's for lunch and wash it down with Barq's and several Abitas, without losing it all on your stoop. The four seasons in your year are: crawfish, shrimp, crab, and King Cake. You "wrench" your hands in the sink with an onion bar to get the crawfish smell off. You don't learn until high school that Mardi Gras is not a national holiday. You believe that purple, green and gold look good together. Your last name isn't pronounced the way it's spelled. You know what a nutria rat is but you still pick it to represent your baseball team. You have spent a summer afternoon on the Lake Pontchartrain seawall catching blue crabs. You describe a color as "K & B Purple." You like your rice and politics dirty. You pronounce the largest city in the state as "Nawlins." You know those big roaches can fly, but you're able to sleep at night anyway. You assume everyone has mosquito swarms in their backyard. You realize the rainforest is less humid than Louisiana. You learn that a seat belt makes a pretty good branding iron... You discover that you can get a sunburn through your car window... When out of town, you stop and ask someone where there is a drive-through Daiquiri place, and they look at you like you have three heads. You have flood insurance. Your burial plot is six feet over rather than six feet under. You consider a Bloody Mary a light breakfast. You push little old ladies out of the way to catch Mardi Gras throws. You leave a parade with footprints on the top of your hands. You have a parade ladder in your shed. Your first sentence was "Throw me something mistah" and your first drink was from a go-cup. You worry about a deceased family member returning in spring floods. You reply to anything and everything about life here with "Only in Nahlins". You have a monogrammed go-cup. You get on a bus marked "Cemeteries" and don’t think twice. You shake out your shoes before putting them on. Your sunglasses fog up when you step outside. No matter where else you go in the world, you are always disappointed in the food. You get up in the morning and start cooking a pot of rice before you give any thought to what you'll fix for dinner. You ask, "How dey running?" and "Are dey fat?" when you're inquiring about seafood quality. When a hurricane is imminent When it starts to rain, you cover your beer instead of your head. You call tomato sauce "red gravy." You eat sno-balls instead of throwing them. Your house payment is less than your air conditioning bill. Your grandparents are called "Maw Maw" and "Paw Paw." You fall asleep to the soothing sounds of four box fans. No one eats healthy. Fried Batter is actually a menu item in some restaurants. You actually get these jokes and pass them on to other friends from Louisiana. |
Now I'm off to drop off a resume at the Central Oil office over on Booth Street in Monroe to apply for a job at one of their "Harde Marts"...