Learnin' How To Speak Pittsburghese!

It's smart to learn to speak the language of the place you're going to visit!

Hiya, Friends!  Zoe here!  Well, in a few days, I'm going on a trip to Pittsburgh.  My main purpose for going is to see my Aunt Colleen and Uncle Lorentz, but another thing I hope to accomplish is to get some practical practice speaking my second language, Pittsburghese!

I don't know if you've noticed, but the twice I've been to the Steel City, I have been baffled by the local parlance.  To be fair, the first time I went, I wasn't even three months old yet.  But I will admit that my own lack of knowledge took my breath away, when I went to Pittsburgh over the summer.

Gum bands, for instance.  I overheard someone ask someone else  for a gum band, and all I could think of was that it sounded fun and delicious.  I thought it was something like a gum-drop, with flavor and sugar, and a little stretch.  Imagine my shock and surprise to find out that a gum band is a rubber-band!  There's nothing delicious about a rubber band!  And if you get snapped with one, it really hurts!

Dahntahn Pixburgh, here I come!

Then I heard about jumbo sandwiches.  Boy, I thought, I could go for a jumbo sandwich, maybe a big grilled cheese, with a juicy slice of tomato, and a pickle.  I'm really hungry, and a regular grilled cheese sandwich won't do. I've heard that 'jumbo' means bigger than regular-sized.  So I said, yeah!  I'll have a jumbo sandwich.  Guess what a jumbo sandwich is.  Guess!  It has nothing to do with how big the sandwich is, and there's no juicy tomato slices.  Jumbo sandwiches, in Pittsburghese, are what the rest of us call bologna sandwiches!  I said that bologna was above my pay grade and went and had pureed carrots instead.  Boy, was I disappointed!

So in that spirit of hoping to avoid more ignernts on my part, I've taken it upon myself to learn Pittsburghese, inside and out, without being too nebby.  Before I go to the Arn City, my room needs redd up an'at, and when I get to Pixburgh, I'm going to run across to the Jynt Igl to pick up some chip-chop ham for some sammitches for my stay at Aunt Colleen's.  I am rilly looking forward to going, but I hope the roads don't get slippy on our way there!  Maybe Aunt Colleen and Uncle Lorentz will take me to a rill stillmill!

How'd I sound, Friends?  Didja think I'd gone native Pittsburgh?  Did I fool ya?  Boy oh boy, I can't wait to try out some of my new skills.  Learning a foreign language is a lot of fun!  I can't wait to practice in real life!