When I was living in NYC, with my parents back in NE Ohio, I once told my mom that we finally got a soda machine in the break room at work. She thought I meant a machine that made ice-cream sodas.
I think it’s a western Canada thing (confirmed in the Wikipedia article on Canadian English).
For myself, I prefer the term “gitch” for underwear and yet I prefer the term “gotch-pull” for a wedgie. But those heathens who use the word “gonch” are just wrong, wrong, wrong.
I don’t know if it’s still true but growing up in the south, anything that looked like ‘Coke’ was a coke. In the North it’s “pop” or “soda pop”. But then when I think of “pop” I’m reminded that in some parts of the country, “pops” can also be cans of beer.
There used to be a morning radio show in the metro Detroit area, ‘Drew and Mike’ where they’d often use this expression as a euphemism for a beer or drink in general. Seems like, especially when talking to Mickey Redmond, Red Wings color analyst: “I’ll probably have a couple pops after the game”.
I’ve heard the term “barley pop” used for a beer, though not at all recently.
Heh, I heard an interview with John Goodman years ago in which he attributed his being overweight to his fondness for ‘oat soda’ he developed in his youth.
It seems to me (as I recall) it’s an upper midwest/northeast thing (beer as ‘pop’).
Michigan native, “up north” generally meant anything north of say Manistee on the west side to Clare in the middle of the state. The UP was a different breed of cat entirely and not generally what was meant by up north.
When I went to MSU in the mid 1970s, “bogue” was very much in vogue, and it kind of morphed into “Bogart”, a person who was being bogue. Not related at all, but there was a Bogue Street on campus named long before bogue was commonplace.
Soft drinks are pop, though we’d understand what soda was if you asked for one. Southerners who say “coke” as generic term for soft drink never made sense to me. Coke was Coca-cola.
Well it’s kinda like saying Kleenex for tissue. The ubiquitous soda became the word for soda.
True, but you don’t care what kind of tissue you get if you ask for a kleenex. If you want a Dr. Pepper and ask for a coke, are you then supposed to clarify what kind of coke you want?
It happens in other languages, too. For example, in Poland – I’m not positive if it’s still the case, but when I was visiting my cousins it was – it was common to refer to any kind of gym shoes/tennis shoes/sneakers/trainers/whatever your local dialect calls them as adidasy. Looks like it still is the case. Note that is says “adidasy nike” which would translate to “Nike adidases.”
More like saying Kleenex when you mean tissue, paper towel, paper napkin, or TP.
CookingWithGas brought back memories of using ‘bogue’ in grade school in the suburbs of Detroit in the mid-70s, and now you’ve reminded me of the associated term ‘bogart’, which I had also forgotten-- “You bogart!”. By the time I was an older teenager in the early 80’s though, the meaning of ‘bogart’, at least in certain circles, became a verb meaning to take an inordinately long time to pass the marijuana cigarette, or to ingest more than one’s share of it. It could also mean bad sharing etiquette in general.
Who wants a Dr. Pepper instead of a Coke? 
And yeah, you’d have to specify if you wanted something off-brand. Generally when people ask for a Coke, they mean Coca-Cola. People get upset when places down here only have Pepsi (seriously).
Yeah, that sounds very similar to how Coke is used in the Southeast. Though I don’t know if in Poland there is an aversion to wearing Nike Adidases, as their is in the Southeast to drinking Pepsi. Though I have noticed that Mountain Dew avoids this but they aren’t considered the same thing as a Coke. Mountain Dew is its own thing.
You betcha!. But I have noticed that we don’t say “Uff da” very much any more. It seems to have switched to “Ope!” which is kind of a cross between “Uff da” and Whoops".
“Ope!” is a common Wisconsinism as well, as demonstrated by Charlie Berens of Manitowoc Minute:
My husband tells me I don’t say ope. Every other Minnesotan claims they don’t say it, until they get caught. I do say oops.
So what, besides tater tots, goes into authentic Minnesota hotdish? It’s sorta predictable that Wisconsinites would load it with cheese & little else. But what of Minnesotans?
Browned hamburger, cream of mushroom (or some other cream of) soup. A can of drained corn (sometimes green beans). Mix together. Top with tater tots. Put in oven until tater tots brown (whatever it says on the tater tot bag).
(Some people add onions or something, but this is the basic basic “its tater tot hotdish” recipe)