Southron & Yankee: American and How She is Spoke

A correspondent from Massachusetts (thanks, Marjorie) referring to this little quiz, has informed me that the choices for non-alcholic beverages were even more deficient than I had supposed. Apparently, "the true yankee calls it 'tonic'". Now that is brand new to me. I had never heard of "tonic" as being anything other than carbonated water with a bit of quinine.

And maybe I shouldn't have included "RC" in the original list. "RC" always used to actually mean "RC". But "coke" could be anything. As in, "I'll have a coke but make it a Nehi." (And a Nehi was always an orange Nehi unless you actually wanted a grape, and why would you?)

Anyone with a love for words ought to be following James J. Kilpatrick's "The Writer's Art". His column appears throughout the country. In Los Angeles, it's in the Metropolitan News-Enterprise. And on the net, thanks be to God. (Although it appears later than the print edition.) A sample can be found here. A few of his more recent columns can be found here, including his first-rate coverage of the doings of the U.S. Supreme Court.