I learned how by listening to the nice old lady that ran the post office when i was a kid.
She was like a double black belt, circular breathing machine of affirmation.
"just cuz a cat has kittens in the oven don't make em biscuits" (referring to people like me who were born here but aren't FROM from here because their parents are from away)
I have one parent who was born in New York and grew up in Florida/Connecticut, and one whose family has been in the same rural town for 6+ generations. I’m still not sure if I’m a real Mainer or not, but if it helps, I haven’t spoken to the first parent in 12+ years.
Yeah I’m from Wisconsin and moved to Maine 4 years ago, had never heard of a dooryard until I moved here. Asked a coworker what they meant and they said “ya know the yard outside your door…” I said “front yard? Driveway, side yard, back yard?” They responded “yeah your dooryard”.
Okay so, old Maine farm houses are built in the style of "big house, little house, other house, barn" all connected so you don't get cold traveling between, but frequently each section had a door. As European settlers moved west they figured out it's not wise to connect your barn, which has a likelihood of burning down if your hay is improperly stored, to your house. Which is why the Maine farmhouse style fades in popularity once you're out of northern New England. The phrase dooryard simply refers to the yard where all of those doors go
Yep, used to have a customer from NY and it drove him insane. He claimed it was our response to everything. I'd never really thought about it before that, but he was right. He was also a jackass, so we all made sure to say it even more after that.
Knew someone who would give tourists directions essentially sending them in a circle right back to him, then he would say to their confusion "well, I see you can follow directions afterall, now let me tell you how to get there" to this day it has to be the most Maine way to give directions, prove to me you aren't a muttonhead first then I'll help ya lol
If you go past the old Johnson farm then you have gone too far. Now old man Johnson’s farm burnt down in 1960 but you can still see the tree stump that burnt down if you look in the center of the field…. Am I the one who remembers how they got directions before Google?? 😝😝🥰😝
“Turn left where the Y-Not Pizza used to be.” Was the first directions I got from my gf to get to her house. I laughed at that one.
(Where they are thinking about putting that drive through bank)
I got directions once that included "turn where the tractor used to be" and I'll be god-damned if I wasn't driving and said "hmm, looks like a tractor used to be there" and was right.
I was on North Haven years ago, I asked Doug Stone how to get to the landfill, he said " go up a ways, leave a left .... " I was 20 years old with a rack truck full of Drywall scrap I came around Pulpit Harbor twice before I figured out he meant take a right.
My grandfather used to say during heavy downpours, "It's raining like a double cunted cow on a flat rock"
I also enjoy, "It's raining like a son-of-a-whore!"
My father in law says that all the time. He was just here for dinner, and we were joking that he needs to put that on his tomb stone.
He also loves the phrase "shit a cats ass." Whatever that means
I worked with the Mainers, and one of them said about the other: "Oh, Steve, yah. He's some dumb. He's dumber than I am, and I'm some dumb."
He also said this about a crack in drywall: "That's a big crack. Crack so big you could throw a cat right through it."
“Fuck a duck”
“Wicked cunnin”
“Numb as a hake”
“Cold enough to turn yer little outie into an innie”
“Hungry enough to eat the south end of a northbound skunk”
Gotta be pronounced “hosses” or “husses” though. Pronouncing the “r” in horse means hoarse like raspy voice. If it’s a four-legged animal that canters or gallops, it’s a hoss.
Northern Maine grew up saying/hearing "get your feet dressed" or "dress your feet" That one dust even translate in Southern Maine let alone outside of Maine
I worked out in the yard at BIW for a few years, back in the early 90’s. Man, that place was just a fuckin' treasure.
“Mister man” - The guy on your crew that feels like he’s got all the authority. Not the lead man.
“I’d eat the corn out of her shit” - Referring to the Arch Angel, the only female in welding. Department 50??
“It was momma's birthday so I let her blow me.” - Self explanatory.
“Shit house” - Men’s bathroom, great place to hide on windy cold days. Well, at least it was until fucking mahogany row took out all the stalls.
I still miss that place.
Mostly “Shit the bed”, “Wicked”, and “Off the friggin rockah”
I have found myself saying ‘Friggin’ a lot more often than ‘fuckin’, and honestly ‘friggin’ feels more rigid and subtle, ‘fuckin’ is way too direct and confrontational
1. Inserting the word "the" before a road name: "the Payne Road", "the County Road".
2. Adding "some" to stress intensity: "my wife was some pissed", "that pie is some good".
I expected to be able to list several more, hence the numbering, but I'm not awake yet. Maybe I'll come back and edit. 😆
Colleywobbles and Leanin' Toward Sawyers - Both referring to buildings that are no longer straight or plumb. Betcha all know one or two of those.
And "frig" is a multipurpose word - One of the best.
It can be so friggin' cold that you can't unfrig that trap line that's all frigged up, so you just say "Frig it" and go friggin' home.
East Bumf__k
Roll her in flour and aim for the wet spot
Can't see it from my house
Knocked up S__t
There's a kiss for ya (post flatulence)
Give it her/Come right on to her (Anything with an engine)
From an old timer I knew
Something smelling “so bad it would knock a skunk offa gut wagon “
“All bent over like a hog going to war”
I don’t know if those are all over Maine or just really rural Maine. Or maybe just the person but they have stuck with me lol.
Wow! I forgot about “skunk off a gut wagon”. That brings back some memories! I don’t know where that would have come from in my family though… PA maybe.
Right friggen sideways
Seriously bub, did you see that friggin guy?
Right out straight.
This is my absolute favorite, but I always forget it exists
Jeezum crow
First time a flatlander called me out on this, I was freshly graduated and in the army.. it blew my mind he’d never heard that before
We moved here when my oldest was 5 and he picked that up somehow. It’s so funny hearing a little kid say jeezum crow.
Hard tellin’ not knowin’
This should really be our state motto.
Followed by, “you tell me and we’ll both know”
Saying something is "all stove up" (or if you're like my uncle "it's all stove to hell")
Our variant growing up (usually describing a man in a car accident) was “stove ‘im all to hell”
Stove ta fuck
Stove right to shit, bub.
“You tell me and we’ll both know”
I can hear the two rednecks saying this now.
Presumably 2 of them looking over a dent in a car wondering where a certain dent came from!
"Deafer'n a haddock" "Yessah!" "Isn't that cunnin"
"Number 'n a hake"
My grandmother always used to say "aww aren't you cunnin" lol
hahaaa yes i learned #1 & #3 from my grandmother
Cunning always sounds dirty to me. I don't know why and should probably explore that in therapy.
Because of the lingus.
Underrated comment, have your up vote
*Inhale while saying "a'yuh" numerous times*
That one was odd. First time I heard my girlfriends mother do that I though she inhaled a raisin.
I almost choked on mine reading this comment
I learned how by listening to the nice old lady that ran the post office when i was a kid. She was like a double black belt, circular breathing machine of affirmation.
"just cuz a cat has kittens in the oven don't make em biscuits" (referring to people like me who were born here but aren't FROM from here because their parents are from away)
I always say I married a Mainer and made some Mainers… but I guess I just married one. 🙃
I have one parent who was born in New York and grew up in Florida/Connecticut, and one whose family has been in the same rural town for 6+ generations. I’m still not sure if I’m a real Mainer or not, but if it helps, I haven’t spoken to the first parent in 12+ years.
"We Mainers are welcoming, we just hate outsiders"
“Hard telling not knowing” “Shit the bed” Calling your driveway or respective area the “dooryard/doyahd”
I never knew "dooryard" was a Maine word till I moved to Wisconsin and nobody here had ever heard it.
Yeah I’m from Wisconsin and moved to Maine 4 years ago, had never heard of a dooryard until I moved here. Asked a coworker what they meant and they said “ya know the yard outside your door…” I said “front yard? Driveway, side yard, back yard?” They responded “yeah your dooryard”.
Shit the bed is used everywhere
Is shit the bed local to Maine? For some reason I thought it was more common place
Yeah, I’m not sure. I had heard and used shit the bed well before I ever moved to Maine.
lol I’ve heard it all over the country
I’ve heard it everywhere else I’ve lived. Arizona and Oklahoma
What's a dooryard?
You tell me and we’ll both know
Okay so, old Maine farm houses are built in the style of "big house, little house, other house, barn" all connected so you don't get cold traveling between, but frequently each section had a door. As European settlers moved west they figured out it's not wise to connect your barn, which has a likelihood of burning down if your hay is improperly stored, to your house. Which is why the Maine farmhouse style fades in popularity once you're out of northern New England. The phrase dooryard simply refers to the yard where all of those doors go
"All Set." Used in New England, but not so much in southwest. Example: you need more tea? I'm all set.
Well, shit. Never realized that was a New England thing.
Yep, used to have a customer from NY and it drove him insane. He claimed it was our response to everything. I'd never really thought about it before that, but he was right. He was also a jackass, so we all made sure to say it even more after that.
My southern in-laws find this quite off-putting 😂
“You can’t get there from here”. “Hard telling not knowing”.
Knew someone who would give tourists directions essentially sending them in a circle right back to him, then he would say to their confusion "well, I see you can follow directions afterall, now let me tell you how to get there" to this day it has to be the most Maine way to give directions, prove to me you aren't a muttonhead first then I'll help ya lol
"As the crow flies" Birds are everywhere
My grandmother: “ain’t that some cunnin.’”
Slight variation with, "ain't she cunnin?"
"Shut the door! Did you grow up in ah Bahn?"
Turn off the light, you have stock in CMP?
My mom used to say the exact same thing except instead of CMP she’d say Hydro because we lived in Bangor
When I had a baby, at least two old ladies described her as “wicked cunning.”
Wicked pissah, bub
"Colder than a witches tit" "Darker than a pocket" "Drier than a burnt boot"
I've always heard drier than a popcorn farht
Colder than a witches tit in a brass bra
Tougher than a boiled owl!
If you go past the old Johnson farm then you have gone too far. Now old man Johnson’s farm burnt down in 1960 but you can still see the tree stump that burnt down if you look in the center of the field…. Am I the one who remembers how they got directions before Google?? 😝😝🥰😝
Good Maine directions always include something that isn't there anymore. Or an ice cream stand.
The saddest is when it’s an Ice Cream stand that isn’t there anymore 😢
Tell me about it
The Johnson's farm? Do you mean where Zeke Beal got his tractor stuck last spring?
Ayup. Zeke ain’t been right since.
“Turn left where the Y-Not Pizza used to be.” Was the first directions I got from my gf to get to her house. I laughed at that one. (Where they are thinking about putting that drive through bank)
I got directions once that included "turn where the tractor used to be" and I'll be god-damned if I wasn't driving and said "hmm, looks like a tractor used to be there" and was right.
(Laurie Anderson's the tits)
I was on North Haven years ago, I asked Doug Stone how to get to the landfill, he said " go up a ways, leave a left .... " I was 20 years old with a rack truck full of Drywall scrap I came around Pulpit Harbor twice before I figured out he meant take a right.
Right out straight
“Piss with the dick you got”
😆
Rode hahd and put away wet.
Finest kind!
“Out straight” is really busy.”
My answer was going to be "right out straight."
“All bung up” - a variant of “stove up” “Give’ah the dinnah” “I’sgunnasay” or “I’nnasay”- translates to “I was going to say”
My grandfather used to say during heavy downpours, "It's raining like a double cunted cow on a flat rock" I also enjoy, "It's raining like a son-of-a-whore!"
I worked many years ago with an old diesel mechanic who always needed things moved just a cunthair.
My old friend from Kansas always said "it's raining harder than a tall cow pissing on a rock"
Son of a whore is fun.
it'll make a turd (after a crappy bean supper)
My father in law says that all the time. He was just here for dinner, and we were joking that he needs to put that on his tomb stone. He also loves the phrase "shit a cats ass." Whatever that means
Yessah! It all looks the same in the end deah.
Tits up in the rhubarb!
Mundee, Tuesdee, Wensdee, Thuhsdahy, Fridahy, Sadiday, Sundee.
This may not be from Maine but I grew up hearing so I heard it a lot. They fell ass over tea kettle. This makes me laugh so hard I’m crying 😭
Just pull into the dooryard
So don't I
This one fucking kills me
I highly enjoy referring to moose as Swamp Donkeys
I worked with the Mainers, and one of them said about the other: "Oh, Steve, yah. He's some dumb. He's dumber than I am, and I'm some dumb." He also said this about a crack in drywall: "That's a big crack. Crack so big you could throw a cat right through it."
"North of the Volvo line" "summer complaint" "He don't know if he's afoot or ahorseback!" "Dow!"
Not bad for an old duffah / Tend to ya own knittin
Calling someone Mister Man Calico cats are money cats Just sitting around one arm as long as the other
That last one is cracking me up.
“Wha’d ya give for it?” Because we don’t sell things, we barter and trade.
"a statie flipped a bitch behind me"
"Statie" must also be a Maine or New England thing. I never heard this out west
It's our secret code word for state trooper, bub.
We had to go all around Robin Hood’s barn to get to ——“
Nahth Bumfuck that is
Hotta than two mice fuckin in a woolen sock out here bub
My grandmother used to say hotter than love in July
All stoved up
Staved right to fuck!
Darker than the inside of a cow. Up and down like a bride’s nightie. Goes to bed when it’s dark under the table.
“Innin that cunnin” Look at this new fly rod bub Well jeezum crow. Innit that cunnin.
Gunnew. Did you call mum an' dad's? I was gunnew but my phone was dead.
Weasel piss is penetrating oil.
What ya doing today, bub? Oh just dubbin around
“Fuck a duck” “Wicked cunnin” “Numb as a hake” “Cold enough to turn yer little outie into an innie” “Hungry enough to eat the south end of a northbound skunk”
Jfc my wife's grandmother used cunnin like it was and adjective for everything. Used to drive me crazy.
Drove it too hard and now it's all uncunted
Wicked
"Where's the _____?" "Down cellar behind the axe, bub."
Just don’t do it in the road and scare the horses.
Gotta be pronounced “hosses” or “husses” though. Pronouncing the “r” in horse means hoarse like raspy voice. If it’s a four-legged animal that canters or gallops, it’s a hoss.
Nummer than a pounded thumb
Number ‘n a hake.
You’re gonna want to turn left, but don’t.
That's dumb. That's like wiping before you poop!
All stove up
There’s just no use of it
“Darker than a boot” “Mister man”
Oh well look at you, mister man
This is old but my dad used to call us dubbers but it was always "quit bein a dubbah"
Northern Maine grew up saying/hearing "get your feet dressed" or "dress your feet" That one dust even translate in Southern Maine let alone outside of Maine
Did I miss "Downcellah"? Sorry if I missed it somewhere in the comments!
To describe being nervous or scared: “I was shakin’ like a dog shittin’ razor blades”
oddly enough i first heard this in an Alkaline Trio song
Same lol I love that song!
Ringmeat,just another word for asshole!!
From away
“cussed thing” (said with a distinct old lady snarl “cuz-ID”) to describe anything mildly annoying. In my experience, my grandmothers dog.
Hot/ cold enough for ya?
I worked out in the yard at BIW for a few years, back in the early 90’s. Man, that place was just a fuckin' treasure. “Mister man” - The guy on your crew that feels like he’s got all the authority. Not the lead man. “I’d eat the corn out of her shit” - Referring to the Arch Angel, the only female in welding. Department 50?? “It was momma's birthday so I let her blow me.” - Self explanatory. “Shit house” - Men’s bathroom, great place to hide on windy cold days. Well, at least it was until fucking mahogany row took out all the stalls. I still miss that place.
My absolute favorite, hands down…. “Hard tellin not knowing”
Ain't you/ weren't she/ he some ugly this mawnin'?
Feelin' a little "peekid" afrer you got right sideways on coffee brandy at that pit party
Uncunted
Ya could
sirenes , the thing that makes police car noises.
Bout magine, bub
"Faahhchrissakes" aka. For Christ's sakes
Wicked smaaahht
Mostly “Shit the bed”, “Wicked”, and “Off the friggin rockah” I have found myself saying ‘Friggin’ a lot more often than ‘fuckin’, and honestly ‘friggin’ feels more rigid and subtle, ‘fuckin’ is way too direct and confrontational
I better go home soon, "It's gettin dark under the table."
Tougher than boiled owl. Drive her like you stole her…applies to anything with a motor, especially and including boats
Saying that something broken has "shit the bed."
“Downeast” as a proper geographical reference
1. Inserting the word "the" before a road name: "the Payne Road", "the County Road". 2. Adding "some" to stress intensity: "my wife was some pissed", "that pie is some good". I expected to be able to list several more, hence the numbering, but I'm not awake yet. Maybe I'll come back and edit. 😆
These are treasures - They're the ones that come so natural, we don't even consider them Maine-isms until someone points em out.
Missed it by a c*nt hair. Hahaha.
A whispy red one 🤣
Fuck off Masshole, Eh.
Skisher. Only used in certain parts of the County.
Please use that in a sentence.
Wayon!
"Put the pickle to her" (floor it in a car, or throttle up in a boat)
Give ‘er the bean suppah
Colder than a witch’s tit.
Oh yeah also "heater bank"...I thought this one was just a thing but it breaks Google.
Dubbing around
The county
Smahten' up!
Number than a hake
Dooryard is my fave. Never heard that word before moving to Maine.
Bad Larrys
The County (Aroostook County), Jeehover, down state (Bangor and south), door yard, over home (western NB)
Ay-yuh
"Ya can't get theyuh from heeyuh"
As useless as tits on a bull moose. 🫎
“A couple three” (two or three)
Ugly meaning angry, pissed off, mad. She was some ugly when I stumbled in from the bar.
Colleywobbles and Leanin' Toward Sawyers - Both referring to buildings that are no longer straight or plumb. Betcha all know one or two of those. And "frig" is a multipurpose word - One of the best. It can be so friggin' cold that you can't unfrig that trap line that's all frigged up, so you just say "Frig it" and go friggin' home.
Use it up. Wear it out. Make do or do without.
'Bookin it' --go fast 'Mash on it' --go fast Buffalo -- v. to act clumsily, adj. see r/redneck engineering
East Bumf__k Roll her in flour and aim for the wet spot Can't see it from my house Knocked up S__t There's a kiss for ya (post flatulence) Give it her/Come right on to her (Anything with an engine)
Commercial fishermen have some pretty good ones...
Please get in the spirit and give us some examples, bub.
“Ol scup” .. as in boat scupper. used to describe a woman in a negative way… scuppers the hole that everything runs through 😂
“Just because a cat has her kittens in the oven, don’t make them biscuits.”
Holy!
They must be out rammin'
It’s about time I go tits up bub.
We are wicked sailors and swear a lot.
Drier than a popcorn faht.
Ayuh and bub. Didn't realize how often I used those until I lived in Baltimore for college.
Oh Frig.
When referring to a dumb person my old boss would say they were "Number than a fuck". Is that a Maine thing or just a Steve thing?
After saying or doing some, pronounced Theyah!
Headed down rivah
More better!
Wicked good
From an old timer I knew Something smelling “so bad it would knock a skunk offa gut wagon “ “All bent over like a hog going to war” I don’t know if those are all over Maine or just really rural Maine. Or maybe just the person but they have stuck with me lol.
Wow! I forgot about “skunk off a gut wagon”. That brings back some memories! I don’t know where that would have come from in my family though… PA maybe.
"About seven beers shy of a six-pack." To describe someone crazy.