Do you say, "In the bushes" to refer to small towns?

In My Humble Opinion
41

I’ve heard it, but I assumed it was just one of those odd hick-isms that are usually a perversion of a real saying.

42

You forgot EAST Buttfck, Egypt. Or just East Buttfck.

(10 years and I still don’t know where I can and can’t curse.)

43

There’s no rule about cursing. Only about insulting.

44

'm not familiar with its use.

45

I agree that “the bush” or “the bushes” to refer to a rural area is archaic. The spin-off of “bush league” for minor league baseball, and by extension for anything that is less than first-rate, is however alive and well and definitely not archaic. It’s like when All in the Family went off the air but The Jeffersons was still going.

46

Wop wops? Is that a common phrase on Mars?

47

Yep, never heard it. “In the sticks” means wayyy outside of town, but does NOT specifically refer to a small town in and of itself.

e.g., Manassas Virginia is “in the sticks” to a D.C. urban dweller.

48

I say “out in the boonies”, I’m quite familiar with “out in the sticks” though don’t normally say it, “out in the bushes” is unfamiliar.

However, comparing it to “bush league” it doesn’t seem like it’d be a particularly odd term, just not one used in these parts.

49

Another vote for “out in the toolies.”

I’ve read that expression came from the tule plant, or weed, that was prevalent in Central California, once upon a time.

Central California is practically all cropland now. Not a tule in sight!
~VOW

50

Boonies, boondocks, sticks, out in the country, middle of nowhere, sure…never heard “in the bushes”.

51

Assuming she’s Australian the phrase is usually written “woop woop”, and you’d never say “the woop woops”, more like “she’s from woop woop”.

BTW the “woop” does not rhyme with “hoop”, I’m having trouble finding an English rhyme for it actually as the ‘oo’ is pronounced somewhere between ‘wop’ and ‘hoop’. Maybe ‘wüp’ ?

52

I’m Canadian and I’ve never heard small, remote towns referred to as ‘in the bushes’. ‘Out in the bush’ would likely be someone describing a camping trip in the wilderness, or the house I lived in out in the middle of nowhere surrounded by trees and Canadian shield landscaping.