So I’m sick at home today. Nothing better to do than surf the net. I’m reading the usual “Jerkweed Customers” threads over at Jezebel, and this one person is telling a story about workin’ at Subway, making a sandwich for a customer … and the customer finally decided on her sauce. She wanted the chipo… the chippa… the… um… chip… chip… CHIP-A-LITTLE! She wanted the CHIPALITTLE sauce!
Now, the clerk is polite and does not correct her. She simply mentions to her coworker to use the chih-POAT-lay sauce, which the coworker does… although the customer insists on correcting the pronunciation: CHIP-a little! (with a little smirk). This apparently goes on for a while … whenever any employee dares to name the Sauce That Must Not Be Named, that’s the customer’s cue to correct 'em with a burst of “CHIP-a little!”
Apparently, it disturbed this customer to think of OTHER customers not knowing how to correctly pronounce this important word, because then she begins correcting the OTHER people trying to order food… only stopping when a couple of them stop to give her stony glances.
Now this particular story struck me funny. I’ve known people like this. Another commenter went on to mention some confusion in taking an order once… because the customer wanted kes-kuh-DILL-yahs. Only when the text on the menu was invoked did it turn out that what was desired were quesadillas.
I felt this second story lacked the punch of the first one, though. Apparently, the customer immediately began pronouncing the word correctly when HEARING it pronounced correctly. They just didn’t know how to pronounce the WORD, was all, never HEARD it pronounced before. And that’s okay. Lots of words I don’t know how to pronounce. But I find a special kind of bizarre humor in people who insist on pronouncing THEIR word THEIR way!
- Knew a guy once who was talking about how he found this thing “mack uh bree.” I asked him what he was talking about. He was one of those fellows who, if you attempt to get him to explain what he means, will repeat the exact same thing he said earlier, as if you did not hear him. And if you explain that you heard him fine, but you did not UNDERSTAND WHAT HE MEANT, he will repeat the exact same thing he said earlier AGAIN, but he will also look at you as if you’re an idiot while he does it, because he talked good plain English, and if you misunderstood, you must be stupid, right?
The word he meant was “macabre.” I corrected his pronunciation. He looked at me like I was a presumptuous git, and repeated, “MACK uh bree,” to let me know he wasn’t going to be unsettled by some johnny come lately! This is a DEMOCRACY, dammit, and MY pronunciation’s just as good as whatever YOURS is! And as far as I know, he pronounces the word that way still.
- I vaguely remember some late night TV show years ago, a talk show, in which the guest was this frenetic little Bible Belt preacher who acted like the world was going to burn somewhere in the next fifteen minutes if we didn’t heed his word NOW. And apparently, one of the major problems facing our society was the problem of Promise Kitty.
I thought, “What?” and wondered if he meant Hello Kitty, which was the only vaguely related thing I could think of that the fellow might have been talking about. The show’s host showed similar confusion; apparently, the show wasn’t scripted; and he asked the preacher man to provide more details, while not QUITE seeming like he was sayin’ “Whachoo talkin’ about, Willis?” The preacher man was ready for this, and launched forth into what seemed to be a rehearsed sermon, in which Promise Kitty was invoked many times as a decaying factor on civilization and sure magnet for God’s wrath. I still didn’t get it, and got up to make a sandwich.
When I got back, I heard the host recouch one of the preacher’s sentences, and repronounce the word as promiscuity, thus making it clear what the preacher was talking about.
The preacher did not take the hint, and in his sweaty bugeyed performance, continued to make clear the evil and seductive nature of Promise Kitty. I finished my sandwich before switching over to the Rerun Network; the preacher was amusingly surreal, but I could not for the life of me figure out if he was simply resisting the host’s attempt to correct him, or if he was so focused on his prepared sermon, he didn’t dare make any changes in his head…
- I once lived near Refugio, Texas, a tiny little town on the gulf coast not far from Corpus Christi. In Spanish, the word is pronounced “reh-FYOO-zhee-oh.” Spanish pronunciation has rules; if you know the rules, it’s kind of hard to screw it up. However, generations of white folks have pronounced it “ruh-FURY-oh,” to the point where they seem to have won by being stubborn and ubiquitous… and to this day, in those parts, if you dare pronounce the word any other way than ruh FURRY oh, you had best be prepared to get some looks. The locals don’t LIKE being told how their town is pronounced, and I once heard a lecture to the effect of, “Maybe you know how to pronounce a Spanish word, but you *don’t *know how to pronounce the name of this town, son.”
Anyone else ever have this experience?
