Maniac`s

[bburtner@moran]

Why do they call people from Maine "Maniac`s???

 

[Nobert]

Because they ain't from 'round here.

 

[scottyrocks]

Lizzie?

 

[LizzieMaine]

Lizzie?

It's because we call "them" "Massholes."

 

[sheeplady]

I thought people from Maine were called Mainers. (An "ers" sound added to the end, like Vermonters or New York Staters.)

 

[LizzieMaine]

It's a term originally intended as an insult -- originated by people from Massachusetts and Connecticut who move up here and figure they're going to show the rubes what it's all about. But like a lot of insulting terms, we've claimed it as our own and throw it back in their faces at every opportunity. Mainiac Pride!

One of the things to understand about New Englanders is that we have a very antagonistic relationship with each other, like six siblings bickering in an overcrowded house. The only time we agree on anything is when the topic is baseball, and even then everybody west of New Britain has it all wrong.

 

[vitanola]

It's a term originally intended as an insult -- originated by people from Massachusetts and Connecticut who move up here and figure they're going to show the rubes what it's all about. But like a lot of insulting terms, we've claimed it as our own and throw it back in their faces at every opportunity. Mainiac Pride!

One of the things to understand about New Englanders is that we have a very antagonistic relationship with each other, like six siblings bickering in an overcrowded house. The only time we agree on anything is when the topic is baseball, and even then everybody west of New Britain has it all wrong.

Mainiacs?

I somehow picture a group of "Down Easters" dancing with lobsters.
[video=youtube_share;fELNMdJ7TvU]http://youtu.be/fELNMdJ7TvU?t=20s[/video]

 

[Nobert]

I thought people from Maine were called Mainers. (An "ers" sound added to the end, like Vermonters or New York Staters.)

The term "Mainer" has a certain pedigree associated with it. I consider myself from Maine, but my family didn't move here until I was eight, which makes me not a Mainer. You have to have few generations of family history under your belt before you can assume that particular title. Which is fine; I mean, I haven't felt ostracized because I've never ridden a snowmobile or pronounce a distinct, midwestern "r" at the end of "car." It's just a bit complicated. I always thought "Maniac," or "Maineiac" was a cutsey term employed by summer people and the like. I didn't know about it's history as a slur.

 

[sheeplady]

The term "Mainer" has a certain pedigree associated with it. I consider myself from Maine, but my family didn't move here until I was eight, which makes me not a Mainer. You have to have few generations of family history under your belt before you can assume that particular title.

The same with being an upstater- at least in some parts.

Just because your cat crawls in an oven and has kittens doesn't mean you call them biscuits.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

Miss Patricola -- Away Down East In Maine (1922)
accompanied by the Virginians

[video=youtube;Zx_GpFDoYp4]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zx_GpFDoYp4[/video]

 

[LizzieMaine]

The same with being an upstater- at least in some parts.

Just because your cat crawls in an oven and has kittens doesn't mean you call them biscuits.

You ain't a Mainer until you automatically pronounce it "Mainah."

 

[LizzieMaine]

Miss Patricola -- Away Down East In Maine (1922)
accompanied by the Virginians

The Virginians??? What, they couldn't get The Acadians?

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

The Virginians??? What, they couldn't get The Acadians?

It was also recorded by The Dixie Daisies.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Sort of like Dick Curless singing "When It's Sleepy Time Down South."

 

[scottyrocks]

The term "Mainer" has a certain pedigree associated with it. I consider myself from Maine, but my family didn't move here until I was eight, which makes me not a Mainer. You have to have few generations of family history under your belt before you can assume that particular title. Which is fine; I mean, I haven't felt ostracized because I've never ridden a snowmobile or pronounce a distinct, midwestern "r" at the end of "car." It's just a bit complicated. I always thought "Maniac," or "Maineiac" was a cutsey term employed by summer people and the like. I didn't know about it's history as a slur.

Then I guess that no matter where I go I will always be a Brooklynite.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Then I guess that no matter where I go I will always be a Brooklynite.

The only man who ever left Brooklyn totally behind was Walter F. O'Malley.

 

[EliasRDA]

Its like being a "No-Anchor".. I'm from Noank CT, And our "symbol" is a fluke anchor with the red circle & slash over it. And I'm damn proud of it, darn tootin.
My moms family is generations of SE CT/RI & some Mass in there, I can trace her roots back to the original ships. And I'm sure some of my dads roots hit that area too siince he's swedish (vikings) even if he & his family are New Yorkers (we dont hold that against him, hehe)

And Lizzy is right about new englanders, I grew up calling those states those names, still do even down here in DE. But I will tell you one thing about Sussex county DE.. dont call yourself a sussex countian unless you have like 5 gens going back IN sussex. You can be a local, or as I am, a transplant. But you call yourself a countian without the background, ohhh holy heck gets started. :eusa_doh:

Funny thing is, I've been here longer than I lived in CT, I've had natives born here call me a countian, but I wont call myself that, no way no how. I'll always be a Northern, with my boston accent (Cah & not car).

 

[LizzieMaine]

You're A Real Mainah IF:

*You eat dinnah at noon and suppah at 4:30. And you never, ever "dine."

*You keep an ice scrapah on the floah of your cah all year round.

*You don't bat an eye when you see a disemboweled deer hanging by its ankles in front of somebody's house.

*You know what Denny Galehouse, Mike Torrez, and Calvin Schiraldi have in common, and why people still hate them.

*Your parents told you not to go out after dark because Gus Heald would get you.

*You know better than to ask for ketchup at Wasses.

*You've spent time trying to solve the puzzles under a Narragansett cap.

*You remember the difference between chicken-gut stink and fish-gut stink.

*You've wondered whatever became of Pauline Young's head.

*As a kid, you were scared of Buck's Grave.

*You know what a Seavey's Needham is, and why there are potatoes in it.

*Your mother dosed you with Father John's Medicine when you had a cold.

*You know the only smart place to buy L. L. Bean stuff is at the Goodwill.

*You've still got paper grocery bags stored under your kitchen sink.

*You know Spring has arrived the first time you say "Friggin' blackflies" out loud.

*You could spell "Yastrzemski" before you could spell your own name.

*You haven't liked Hoodsie cups since they did away with the little wooden spoons.

*"Beans and hot dogs" does *not* mean "Beanie Weanies."

*You know summer is over when the posters go up for Union Fair.

*Your wedding reception -- if you had one -- was held at a Grange Hall.

*You know to roll up the cah windows when you get to Rumford.

*You still quote Eddie Driscoll.

*At least one item of furniture in your house was paid for with Beano winnings.

*You've bought a car from an ad reading "Good sticker, will run."

 

[Alice Blue]

I consider myself from Maine, but my family didn't move here until I was eight, which makes me not a Mainer. You have to have few generations of family history under your belt before you can assume that particular title.

Yes, the saying in New Hampshire is it takes five generations in the ground to be local.

The Vermonters call us Massachusetts folk "Flatlanders." My family moved to Massachusetts in '64 so I'm not technically local, but I still bristle when enlightened folk move to the hilltowns and then call the locals who won't follow their directions "rednecks." I don't know when redneck came in, it's not really a New England term. When I was growing up we were called "boonies" by the students at the elite prep schools.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I don't know when redneck came in, it's not really a New England term. When I was growing up we were called "boonies" by the students at the elite prep schools.

That's an example of the Creeping Southernification that irritates me so much about modern culture. "Redneck" has always been a traditional Southern term, but it had no currency here until the '90s or so. When I was growing up "rednecks" -- meaning excessively rural, woodsy folk -- were called "harveys," and they lived in "Harveytown." I have no idea where the term came from, but we all knew what it meant. And it was a *local* term, not some synthetic Southern barbarism foisted on us by the Boys From Marketing.

Harveys drove skiddahs in the woods and chewed spruce gum and didn't give a g. d. what anybody thought of them. They didn't drive big-tired tricked-out pickup trucks and dip snuff and fly Confederate flags to create just the right "redneck image." Anybody here who would have attempted to fly a Confederate flag when I was growing up would have been sewn up in it and tossed off the Waldo-Hancock Bridge.

Another term I can't stomach is "townie," which is what the hipsters who've moved up here to Create Arrrrrrrrrt call those of us who call it "aht."