11 Silly Sayings That Will Only Make Sense If You’re From Arkansas
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J.B. VanDyke
Author
The way Arkansans talk is one of my favorite things about the Natural State. From the time I learned to talk, I grew up hearing and speaking fluent Arkansan—and to me there’s nothing like hearing a single sentence to know you’re home. The 11 sentences below don’t seem silly to us at all. They sound like home, but they sound a little different to out-of-staters. That’s alright, they’re fixin’ to get some education. Bless their hearts.
There is a lot of agriculture in the Natural State, so it would be understandable if someone thought this referred to the welfare of actual hogs, but no. No, that is not what it means at all.
Here in Arkansas, Toad Suck can mean a park, a community, or a festival, but it doesn’t mean anyone is going to go actually suck on a toad. Though I suppose if one were so inclined that is none of our business.
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I appreciate that this sounds like some kind of expression of extreme distance like "back of beyond," but no, there is an actual, real place called Possum Grape.
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Fifty-Six isn’t a euphemism like eighty-six, it’s a small community near Mountain View, and it’s awfully pretty around those parts, so perhaps you should follow this advice. Mirror Lake, Blanchard Spring, and Blanchard Springs Caverns are all there.
This one usually means it’s game day for the hogs, and there's only one destination for a day like that: Fayetteville.
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This is particularly confusing in its abbreviated form, WPS, which is frequently a three-letter Facebook status during football season. WPS doesn’t mean Whoa Panda Snacks or Where Panthers Sit or anything like that. It generally means the Hogs are doing well.
No, frogs don’t have hair, but if they did it would be pretty fine, wouldn’t it?
Yourmamaanem might sound like a dystopian society from a young adult novel, but it’s not. It’s simply a group of people that includes your mom, your whole family, and basically everyone you know.
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Rest assured, it doesn’t mean the big house or the white house or anything like that. It means "the house where I live." Someone who is going to "the house" is going home.
While it may sound to an out-of-towner like there’s a hip new store called The Gettin’ Place, Arkansans know what the gettin’ place means. It means it’s none of your business where I got it, what a silly question.
This one probably sounds completely unintelligible to the uninitiated, but it’s really very simple. The person using this phrase means that they are preparing to prepare to stand up, though the exact definition of "a minute" will likely remain a mystery until said person stands.
In short, this dog is good example of what it looks like when someone is "fixin’ to get around, here in a minute."
In short, this dog is good example of what it looks like when someone is "fixin’ to get around, here in a minute."
You can find words only Arkansans understand at this link. For phrases we all heard growing up, read this article.
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