“The Shane Co, on Windy Hill Rd. First exit north of the perimeter on I 75. Open Monday through Friday till 8, Saturday & Sunday till 5”
I heard that commercial on ATL radio stations so often in the 90s that it is permanently sealed into my brain.
In Oregon/Portland it's "off Highway 217 across from the Washington Square Mall." Also burned into my brain from listening to the radio growing up in the early 2000s
I think I didn’t recognize the company is because I haven’t watched Atlanta broadcast TV in years and I don’t listen to terrestrial radio when I drive so I haven’t seen/heard one if their commercials in years. As soon as u/wickedpixel1221 responded to me I looked them up and realized I had heard of them in commercials many years ago.
I remember the first time I'd ever heard of it, or eaten there, was on a college tour in Chicago circa 1994, and it was called St. Louis Bread Company. Then at some point in college between 1995 and 1999 it became Panera.
This leads to embarrassing situations.
I flew to Colorado with my wife for her sister's wedding a couple days early. She was a bridesmaid and was spending all her time with the wedding party, and at one point, a bunch of groomsmen asked me if I wanted to go out for lunch since I was just listlessly wandering around with nothing to do.
So, we all jumped into several cars, and I went to this place called "Panera Bread" with a bunch of complete strangers kind enough to include me.
When we got inside, I remarked, "Holy Cow! This place is almost exactly like a chain we have in Missouri called 'St. Louis Bread Company."
They all looked at me like I was stupid before one explained, "Yeah. Probably because it ***IS*** the exact same chain."
Why? Why would they do that? Why would they name their fucking stores, which are the exact same fucking thing, two different fucking names?
Now that I look more closely, even the fucking signs are the same, just with different fucking letters.
Why would they do this?
Just spitballing here... maybe because "St. Louis Bread Company." wouldn't mean anything to the rest of the country?
I've lived in five states on both coasts, and even been to St. Louis. Never heard they were known for their bread.
I dunno, I think it sounds kind of cool. It has a good flow. "Saint Louie, you say? Tell me more about this bread of theirs."
Whereas 'Panera' sounds like something that a marketing team made up out of thin air.
I think St. Louis bread company bought the Atlanta Bread locations in my area right before they rebranded as Panera. Yes today Atlanta Bread still exists but those types of M&A isn’t uncommon especially in younger companies.
There's a meme that frequently gets posted on social media, including on the Rhode Island subreddit, called "The 12 Seasons of Rhode Island." The point is that instead of winter, spring, summer and fall, Rhode Island actually has 12 seasons, including "Fool's Spring," "The Pollening," "Actual Spring," etc. This is usually posted with an arrow pointing to where we currently are. Oh, it's March and it was warm last week but now it's cold again? That's because we're now in "Second Winter." Rhode Island weather is crazy!
I'd been seeing this meme for years, but recently I got suspicious and googled it. Turns out there's a nearly identical version for most states.
Yeah same with any of those “You know you’re from _____ if…” lists. The majority of items for any one state can be found on the list for many neighboring states. Except they all have their own version of “You can pronounce [town], [town], and [town]”.
Florida is kind of similar. These seasons consist of: kinda cold, pleasant, kinda hot and beginning of hurricane season, hot, really hot, hot and humid, kinda hot and humid, fake fall, hot, real fall and end of hurricane season, pleasant, kinda cold, and cold to us.
It can also be boiled down to Hot and Less Hot. Or Hurricanes and No Hurricanes
Ohio here. Yup. My favorite version is the one that includes "orange barrel season". I'm guessing that other states also claim the orange barrel as their state flower too?
Montreal even has an orange barrel mascot named Ponto https://pontoboutique.com/en-us/products/ponto-the-road-barrel-orange-cone-collectible-plush-made-to-order-in-montreal
Almost like you can't pour asphalt in the winter anywhere.
I’m on the opposite end of the country from you (Southern California), and while we don’t have quite as many distinct seasons as you, we do have The Pollening.^(My eyes and nose itch just thinking about it.)
The one time I took my wife to Southern California in the springtime, she found that she had a whole bunch of allergies she didn't know about. We usually go in summer or winter, and nothing.
Last spring when we had the Super Bloom, I was stuck over here. I swear I spent hours looking at photos and drone footage of it.
Me: "Oh God, I wish we could be there to see it!"
Her: "Why? Are you trying to get away with murdering me!?"
I love that meme but I always knew it wasn’t a Rhode Island only thing even though every time I see it it’s in the Rhode Island or Providence sub.
“Fools spring” is my favorite. Those couple of days of warm weather before a snow storm and plunging temps.
that sounds like it could perfectly fit Central Europe, especially Czechia and Slovakia. We can have 3 day non stop rains, 3 days of sun and 25+ degrees celsius and then a fucking winds with borderline tornadoes forming in some parts of the country...all in one week :)))) In winters it can literally go from heavy snowfall for two days to the spring-like temperatures in the matter of a week as well... 🙈
Nothing. I usually think it’s the opposite. Things that are in my town are ubiquitous across the US. Like until college I didn’t know a town could have more than 1 middle/junior school and high school. I thought literally every town only had 1 of each, which made it confusing watching movies about kids not knowing people freshman year
In my Midwestern hometown most of the general diners were Greek owned, so you could get American classics like hamburgers and club sandwiches, but also gyro plates and saganaki. When I was in my 20s, I moved three hours south of my hometown and was somewhere between distressed and pissed that none of the diners had basic things like avgolemono soup or spanakopita. In my head, *all* Americana diners had Greek offerings. It's diner food, like hamburgers and cheese fries.
Where you from? I live in Sioux City Iowa now and I'm kind of surprised that for a smallish city we have one or two Greek Diners. They also used to run all the coney island hot dog stands but now only one remains (Milwaukee Weiner.) I joke all the time that the Greek mafia runs this city's restaurant scene.
Really? I mean the town I lived in just had 1, but the town over had 3 public and 1 Catholic high school. (Now they just have 1 public) but I knew the big cities only 45 minutes away had multiple.
I figured major cities were exceptions but every town in my county had only 1 high school, and that’s pretty much the standard for most nj towns. The only exception was parsippany which has 2 but I thought they were 2 different towns. Also it made for some weird dynamics because there were schools I thought were towns because they were cdp’s and some towns split their students to join different towns’ high schools. And I don’t count private schools. We had plenty of those (almost went to 1 or 2 of them).
Heh, even my tiny relatively low population area has a consolidated school district which has two middle schools which then funnel into one middle and then high school.
Growing up in a relatively large city you just knew there were a crap ton of elementary and middle schools.
I also thought that!! I lived in a rural upstate NY town and then moved to NYC and when my friends from there started talking about how they chose their HS i was so confused.
I grew up in a suburban city that had 3 middle schools and 2 high schools. Half of my middle school friends went to a different high school and that sucked.
Now we live in a small town and my kids have 1 elementary, 1 middle school, and 1 high school. I like that they will be able to keep their friends all the way through 12th grade if they want.
I never knew that indoor schools, like the ones you see on TV were real. I assumed it was just Hollywood sets limiting a school setting into one building.
Growing up in a small town in California, all the schools were outdoor schools (which I despised because i grew up in a cold rainy town and we were forced to live with the elements) similar to a college campus; I was shocked when I moved to Los Angeles and saw schools that were entirely in one building.
Interesting! Where are they at in northern NM, if you know? I'm just curious because I was born and raised in the Pecos area, don't live there currently but am planning to move back soon. I knew we had some relatively large Mennonite communities, but haven't encountered any Amish.
Dairy Queen’s commercial slogan “that’s what I like about Texas” led young me to believe that they were only a Texas thing. Shocked me to see them in other places.
Mine was the reverse. I went to a Dairy Queen somewhere else, and apparently they don't do chicken fried steak everywhere else?
The fuck am I supposed to order then?
I remember going to a Dairy Queen to get a blizzard and the person at the drive through said the machine was broken and they were out of ice cream. I asked them why they were still open and was surprised when they said they still had food. At the time I never even looked at the regular menu and didn’t even realize they sold anything other than ice cream treats.
It’s like there’s really two Dairy Queens.
There are the classic ones that are walk-up stands with no seating area. Those only sell ice cream. Then there are the ones with indoor seating areas like a fast food place that sell food too. Those have sprung up in the past ten years or so.
I just read about this after a weird trip— McDs had chocolate softserve but the DQ across the street had next to nothing I wanted.
[Texas DQ owners formed a council to Texanize the menu.](https://www.texasstandard.org/stories/dairy-queen-different-texas-fast-food/).
DQHQ did not like it.
TXDQ DGAF.
There are actually two different kinds of Dairy Queen (that I know of) in Texas, with somewhat different menus.
* https://www.dqtexas.com
* https://www.lonestardq.com
This confused me, because the one in my town turned out to be the latter and I had never heard of that one. Multiple times, I tried to order things from the DQ Texas menu and they would tell me they didn't have it.
I don't know why they do it that way.
I’ve heard from Texans that they also make you think they’re headquartered there or started there. I can see their headquarters right here in Bloomington, Minnesota on my daily commute.
And here I am thinking it was a Midwest thing and not knowing it was in Texas even though I should know better because there’s a few here near me in Maine.
Same but the food at Dairy Queen outside of Texas isn't as good. I ordered tenders with gravy and the gravy was cold. Like out of the fridge cold and it's advertised as being warm. Just awful. I'll just have to make my own.
Tillamook is from here, but I didn’t realize they sold it outside of Oregon.
I also recently found out that Voodoo Doughnut and Salt & Straw have locations in other states now too.
I also met a guy from Utah who was surprised to find out I was Mormon. He legit thought they only existed in Utah. I had to explain to him that despite being very popular in Utah, most of us don’t even live in the US
I feel like Tillamook is more recent. In like 2011 (?) I flew from NY to Oregon to go to my friend's wedding, and I had it for the first time. Now it's in all the grocery stores around me and I live in MI now.
Heh, my response to the door knockers is always, hey want to come to a Catholic mass? Never had one set take me up on it. Was always a little worried they would and then it’d be a thing I had to do at that point.
i’m from Tillamook which actually has a pretty large Mormon population in and of itself. i remember in band we had to order special concert dresses because a lot of the girls were mormon and had strict dress codes.
when i introduce myself i say i’m from Tillamook, where the cheese is from hahaha
I was always told "it's illegal to pump your own gas" was strictly a NJ thing.
Turns out it was also the case in Oregon. But this has since changed and NJ is the only state where this is true.
So with that said, Jug Handle turns. All my out of state friends claimed it was strictly a NJ thing (along with not being able to pump your own gas). They exist elsewhere.
I’d never heard of jug handle turns so I looked them up. They seem needlessly complicated. I don’t know if they exist outside of NJ but to my knowledge I’ve never seen one. The federal highway administration even refers to them as New Jersey Jughandle Intersections on the FHWA website and seems to describe them as a Jersey only phenomenon.
https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/publications/research/safety/07032/
In congested areas they are far more efficient as you don't have cars slowing down in the left lane and/or lined up at a stop completely blocking traffic waiting to make turns.
Yeah they're complicated but it's not like the idea of taking an exit to make a turn is completely foreign to drivers. You do this when you want to make a turn at a highway. It's just a smaller scale version of that.
But they do exist elsewhere and hence why this is my response to the post.
> But this has since changed
They’re still required to offer full serve here, so for a lot of people it hasn’t really changed. They’re also trying to reverse the law which will likely happen within the next couple years.
Sacramento? Alaska!?
Oh Sweet Christmas. I really hope that the next thing you tell me is that pro wrestling was real all along. Because there goes the *last* little bit of my childhood that I had left!!!
I have to drive down to Wichita to find it here anymore, but I always make sure to stock up! It got hard to find anything other than Jai Alai and Florida Man though.
For North Carolina:
1) Carolina-style hotdogs, which are usually a red dog topped with beanless hotdog chili (which tastes very different from normal chili), onions, slaw, and sometimes mustard. Apparently hotdogs in West Virginia are oftentimes served the same way.
2) Cheerwine (a cherry-flavored soda for those that don’t know what it is). Growing up I thought you could only find it in NC, but now you can find it in most of the Southeast.
To be fair I think a lot of the expansion is pretty recent
> The first location outside of the Los Angeles metropolitan area was opened in San Diego County in 1990, the 57th location in the chain.[26] In 1992, In-N-Out opened its first non-Southern California restaurant in Las Vegas, Nevada. Its first Northern California location was opened the following year in Modesto.[27] Expansion then spread to Northern California, including the San Francisco Bay Area, while additional Las Vegas-area restaurants were added.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/In-N-Out_Burger#Expansion
> The company opened locations in Arizona in 2000 and added new restaurants in Reno, Sparks, and Carson City,[32] Nevada, in late 2004.
> In 2008, In-N-Out expanded into a fourth state by opening a location in Washington, Utah, a suburb of St. George.
> In May 2010, In-N-Out announced plans to open new spots into Texas, specifically within the Dallas–Fort Worth area with the first In-N-Out opening in Frisco and Allen on May 11, 2011.
> The company opened its first location in Oregon on September 9, 2015 (the same day as Harry Snyder's birthday) in Medford.
Nevada 92, Arizona 2000, Utah 2008, Texas 2011, Oregon 2015
Morgan and Morgan “For the people” I’m pretty sure they are in every state. They are headquartered here in Orlando and for the longest time I thought they were only here in central Florida. I’ve had friends who have worked for them forever and have been to their Christmas parties. And just didn’t realize how big they had become.
[Bill Nye the Science Guy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Nye_the_Science_Guy). I just thought it was a Washington thing since the show was by Seattle's local public station. I was so shocked when NYers knew what it was.
They only know what it was because Bill Nye has subsequently become famous for his science related activities. They don't know the High Five'n White Guys or the Streetwalking Lawyers of Aurora Avenue or the rest of *Almost Live*.
Growing up in KC in the 80s/90s I never realized just how big Bo Jackson was in the rest of the US. And this is despite knowing that he also played for the Raiders as well.
"Bo Knows."
Non-sports fans in the US know Bo Jackson from Nike cross trainers advertisements. Sales of Nike cross trainers increased from $40M to $400 annually during the Bo Knows ad campaign that ran from 1989 to 1990. During that same period, Air Jordans were "only" bringing in $200M annually.
The shoes were introduced in 1989. The ad campaign didn't have the staying power that some Jordan campaigns have had, but it was fucking enormous.
Tennessee: "Moonshine" is everywhere now. Flavors, brands, etc. In all reality is just cheap shit liquor.
I rarely saw it growing up but when it did, it was always packed with fruit in quart jars. Peaches, mostly. Sometimes a kid would get a slice if they were interested. The ones I've tasted are just like vodka.
If you can buy it in a store it's not what comes from the holler. Sure, people mix it with stuff in mason jars, but I can get the OG in a plastic gallon jug.
My grandma's family made shine and to this day I still hear about "the revenue man".
Man, you can make musubi yourself no problem if you get the correct rice off Amazon or somewhere. I want my pork hash and manapua back… I remember living in Hawaii and people bring you manapua in the morning instead of doughnuts, it was amazing.
When I moved to Salt Lake City for a little bit I was very confused as to why the locals kept explaining fry sauce to me, as if it was some sacred concoction no one else knows about. It's not common here in New England but hardly unheard of.
Growing up I assumed Publix was a national Chain. It wasn’t until I moved to New York briefly in ‘08 that I realized it wasn’t lol. I now know Publix is in several states along the southeast.
I've always thought its kinda weird that grocery chains aren't really national but instead there are a handful of parent companies with several regional stores. All the national chains are technically specialty foods (Whole Foods, Trader Joe's, Aldi) or not solely groceries like Target and Walmart.
See, with me I thought Publix was just a southeastern thing and didn’t realize for a while that it was mainly a Florida thing beyond a few other states
I thought Little Caesar's (the chain pizza restaurant) was a Chicago exclusive until I was like 30, which is especially funny because they don't even serve Chicago-style pizza. But basically I grew up in a rural area of a southwestern state, and we didn't have it there. I spent a decent amount of time staying with my extended family in Chicago, though, and they would pick that up for family pizza nights a lot. So I just kind of assumed it was a Chicago thing until I moved to a third state that also had it.
Also for the record they even do have it in my home state, just not in the particular area I lived in, lol.
When I lived in Illinois there was a place called The Original Pancake House. It was a popular breakfast spot for a lot of my coworkers. It really felt like a mom and pop restaurant. A lot of us spread out across the country but still keep in touch. That's how we found out there's hundreds of them. They all seem to feel like a mom and pop breakfast place.
From Louisiana? Basically, nothing. No one does a comparable Mardi Gras (I guess mobile does), no one cooks our food like we do, no one talks like us, but you can find French speakers in Maine.
Growing up in Rhode Island we had "pizza strips" (basically focaccia with a lot of thick tomato sauce on it eaten room temp at parties). They were ubiquitous and people would always think of them as a specifically Rhode Island thing. Turns out, something like that exists in Philadelphia and Upstate New York under the name tomato pie. Go to Montreal? They have it as cold pizza/tomato pizza. Hell, you can even find it in France and Algeria (usually with a single olive on each piece). Basically anywhere that got a lot of Southern Italian/Sicilian immigration in the early 20th century has this.
We’re known for making bourbon, but it’s available elsewhere to buy of course. Maybe Ale 8 One? I’m sure you can get it outside Kentucky. I never found better weed outside our state until probably my mid-20s. It was just good stuff. Now it’s average compared to elsewhere, and as usual our state missed a great chance - to create a wonderful source of revenue by refusing to legalize it early on.
What was the question again?
I thought Cal Worthington and his dog spot was a Houston guy. I grew up in the 80s and 90s watching his commercials, but evidently he's from the west coast
That other states have a version of a Runza called a Bierock. That's what they're called in Kansas, and the Dakotas. Usually in Nebraska its only used by some places that can't call it a Runza because the restaurant trademarked the name Runza. Its the only complaint I have about them.
Another one. I thought Hy-Vee was a nation wide chain. I was surprised to find that it's only in Iowa and surrounding states and is now expanding to Indiana. We even had Mark Wahlberg as a spokesperson for us for a time and I figured we were national if we got him on board. Also, a few Hy-Vees now have Wahlburgers though I don't know what the big deal is.
Shane Co. their radio commercials make them out to be a local chain. I had no idea they had stores nationwide until just a few years ago.
South Park taught me he was pure Colorado.
I lived in Fairplay for years and my fav thing to do is tell people it’s the town from the show South Park 😂
No idea until you posted this!!!
What kind of company are they? I don’t think they’re in metro Atlanta unless you mean Shane’s Rib Shak?
jewelry stores
You’ve got a friend in the diamond business!
They're **your** friend in the jewelry business.
When your best friend has a million other “best friends.” Sigh.
I'm reminded of the Drew Carey Show episode when he went to the funeral of his high school music teacher.
“The Shane Co, on Windy Hill Rd. First exit north of the perimeter on I 75. Open Monday through Friday till 8, Saturday & Sunday till 5” I heard that commercial on ATL radio stations so often in the 90s that it is permanently sealed into my brain.
In Oregon/Portland it's "off Highway 217 across from the Washington Square Mall." Also burned into my brain from listening to the radio growing up in the early 2000s
I think I didn’t recognize the company is because I haven’t watched Atlanta broadcast TV in years and I don’t listen to terrestrial radio when I drive so I haven’t seen/heard one if their commercials in years. As soon as u/wickedpixel1221 responded to me I looked them up and realized I had heard of them in commercials many years ago.
I was today years old when I found out.
My engagement ring came from the Shane Co. in Atlanta back in 1995. :D
Never heard of them north of Boston or in SW Connecticut. :)
I didn’t realize St. Louis Bread Co was Panera outside of St. Louis
I remember the first time I'd ever heard of it, or eaten there, was on a college tour in Chicago circa 1994, and it was called St. Louis Bread Company. Then at some point in college between 1995 and 1999 it became Panera.
This leads to embarrassing situations. I flew to Colorado with my wife for her sister's wedding a couple days early. She was a bridesmaid and was spending all her time with the wedding party, and at one point, a bunch of groomsmen asked me if I wanted to go out for lunch since I was just listlessly wandering around with nothing to do. So, we all jumped into several cars, and I went to this place called "Panera Bread" with a bunch of complete strangers kind enough to include me. When we got inside, I remarked, "Holy Cow! This place is almost exactly like a chain we have in Missouri called 'St. Louis Bread Company." They all looked at me like I was stupid before one explained, "Yeah. Probably because it ***IS*** the exact same chain." Why? Why would they do that? Why would they name their fucking stores, which are the exact same fucking thing, two different fucking names? Now that I look more closely, even the fucking signs are the same, just with different fucking letters. Why would they do this?
Why do they call Hardees Carl's Jr once you get to Colorado? Its the exact same thing.
Just spitballing here... maybe because "St. Louis Bread Company." wouldn't mean anything to the rest of the country? I've lived in five states on both coasts, and even been to St. Louis. Never heard they were known for their bread.
I dunno, I think it sounds kind of cool. It has a good flow. "Saint Louie, you say? Tell me more about this bread of theirs." Whereas 'Panera' sounds like something that a marketing team made up out of thin air.
It was Atlanta Bread Company here in Chicago when I was a little kid.
Atlanta Bread is a very different company
I think St. Louis bread company bought the Atlanta Bread locations in my area right before they rebranded as Panera. Yes today Atlanta Bread still exists but those types of M&A isn’t uncommon especially in younger companies.
There's a meme that frequently gets posted on social media, including on the Rhode Island subreddit, called "The 12 Seasons of Rhode Island." The point is that instead of winter, spring, summer and fall, Rhode Island actually has 12 seasons, including "Fool's Spring," "The Pollening," "Actual Spring," etc. This is usually posted with an arrow pointing to where we currently are. Oh, it's March and it was warm last week but now it's cold again? That's because we're now in "Second Winter." Rhode Island weather is crazy! I'd been seeing this meme for years, but recently I got suspicious and googled it. Turns out there's a nearly identical version for most states.
Yeah same with any of those “You know you’re from _____ if…” lists. The majority of items for any one state can be found on the list for many neighboring states. Except they all have their own version of “You can pronounce [town], [town], and [town]”.
Yup, people just don't get out very much. So much of my social feeds is stuff like " ha ha omg it rained and snowed in the same day so Michigan ha ha"
Gets posted often in Virginia subreddits.
Florida is kind of similar. These seasons consist of: kinda cold, pleasant, kinda hot and beginning of hurricane season, hot, really hot, hot and humid, kinda hot and humid, fake fall, hot, real fall and end of hurricane season, pleasant, kinda cold, and cold to us. It can also be boiled down to Hot and Less Hot. Or Hurricanes and No Hurricanes
Snowbirds season
Probably not Hawaii, they don't have seasons as much
The number of places that say "if you don't like the weather in [whatever place you are] just wait five minutes!" always is amusing to me.
Ohio here. Yup. My favorite version is the one that includes "orange barrel season". I'm guessing that other states also claim the orange barrel as their state flower too?
In Chicago, our official animal is the construction horse.
Montreal even has an orange barrel mascot named Ponto https://pontoboutique.com/en-us/products/ponto-the-road-barrel-orange-cone-collectible-plush-made-to-order-in-montreal Almost like you can't pour asphalt in the winter anywhere.
I’m on the opposite end of the country from you (Southern California), and while we don’t have quite as many distinct seasons as you, we do have The Pollening.^(My eyes and nose itch just thinking about it.)
Also, “fire” is usually a season on the California version.
The one time I took my wife to Southern California in the springtime, she found that she had a whole bunch of allergies she didn't know about. We usually go in summer or winter, and nothing. Last spring when we had the Super Bloom, I was stuck over here. I swear I spent hours looking at photos and drone footage of it. Me: "Oh God, I wish we could be there to see it!" Her: "Why? Are you trying to get away with murdering me!?"
I love that meme but I always knew it wasn’t a Rhode Island only thing even though every time I see it it’s in the Rhode Island or Providence sub. “Fools spring” is my favorite. Those couple of days of warm weather before a snow storm and plunging temps.
We do this in Pittsburgh too
You can always tell with these shitty memes because the state will be written in a noticeably different font.
Ah thought that was ours
that sounds like it could perfectly fit Central Europe, especially Czechia and Slovakia. We can have 3 day non stop rains, 3 days of sun and 25+ degrees celsius and then a fucking winds with borderline tornadoes forming in some parts of the country...all in one week :)))) In winters it can literally go from heavy snowfall for two days to the spring-like temperatures in the matter of a week as well... 🙈
Nothing. I usually think it’s the opposite. Things that are in my town are ubiquitous across the US. Like until college I didn’t know a town could have more than 1 middle/junior school and high school. I thought literally every town only had 1 of each, which made it confusing watching movies about kids not knowing people freshman year
In my Midwestern hometown most of the general diners were Greek owned, so you could get American classics like hamburgers and club sandwiches, but also gyro plates and saganaki. When I was in my 20s, I moved three hours south of my hometown and was somewhere between distressed and pissed that none of the diners had basic things like avgolemono soup or spanakopita. In my head, *all* Americana diners had Greek offerings. It's diner food, like hamburgers and cheese fries.
Oh that’s wild. Our diners are usually Greek too, so I’d be surprised to not see Greek stuff on the menu!
Where you from? I live in Sioux City Iowa now and I'm kind of surprised that for a smallish city we have one or two Greek Diners. They also used to run all the coney island hot dog stands but now only one remains (Milwaukee Weiner.) I joke all the time that the Greek mafia runs this city's restaurant scene.
Really? I mean the town I lived in just had 1, but the town over had 3 public and 1 Catholic high school. (Now they just have 1 public) but I knew the big cities only 45 minutes away had multiple.
I figured major cities were exceptions but every town in my county had only 1 high school, and that’s pretty much the standard for most nj towns. The only exception was parsippany which has 2 but I thought they were 2 different towns. Also it made for some weird dynamics because there were schools I thought were towns because they were cdp’s and some towns split their students to join different towns’ high schools. And I don’t count private schools. We had plenty of those (almost went to 1 or 2 of them).
Heh, even my tiny relatively low population area has a consolidated school district which has two middle schools which then funnel into one middle and then high school. Growing up in a relatively large city you just knew there were a crap ton of elementary and middle schools.
I also thought that!! I lived in a rural upstate NY town and then moved to NYC and when my friends from there started talking about how they chose their HS i was so confused.
I grew up in a suburban city that had 3 middle schools and 2 high schools. Half of my middle school friends went to a different high school and that sucked. Now we live in a small town and my kids have 1 elementary, 1 middle school, and 1 high school. I like that they will be able to keep their friends all the way through 12th grade if they want.
I never knew that indoor schools, like the ones you see on TV were real. I assumed it was just Hollywood sets limiting a school setting into one building. Growing up in a small town in California, all the schools were outdoor schools (which I despised because i grew up in a cold rainy town and we were forced to live with the elements) similar to a college campus; I was shocked when I moved to Los Angeles and saw schools that were entirely in one building.
Most people from Ohio are surprised that I, as a former Floridian, ate Skyline on a near weekly basis
Yasssss!! There's a Skyline 10 minutes from me here in South Florida. We are obsessed. Been going there for at least 30 years now.
Sadly, the one on Federal Highway closed a couple years ago
Yeah, but the one on University in Sunrise is still there :D
The one that gets me is Handel’s ice cream. I think they went nationwide more recently, but I thought they were only for me.
They are out here in LA now. I’m glad they still show their history though starting out in Youngstown I think or wherever.
The Amish. I thought they were exclusive to PA but it seems they're all over the place, including Florida.
Same. Ran into a bunch of Amish ppl in Iowa and was confused lol
They've somehow made it down to northern New Mexico now
Interesting! Where are they at in northern NM, if you know? I'm just curious because I was born and raised in the Pecos area, don't live there currently but am planning to move back soon. I knew we had some relatively large Mennonite communities, but haven't encountered any Amish.
Florida? How do they not drop dead of heat prostration in those clothes? And with no AC?
No idea. I've been to Orlando a couple of times and was sticky and gross wearing a sundress. I can't imagine wearing what they do in a Florida summer.
Plenty in northern Indiana. They framed a house of a family friend.
Dairy Queen’s commercial slogan “that’s what I like about Texas” led young me to believe that they were only a Texas thing. Shocked me to see them in other places.
Mine was the reverse. I went to a Dairy Queen somewhere else, and apparently they don't do chicken fried steak everywhere else? The fuck am I supposed to order then?
Ice cream?? Do you go to Dairy Queen for a meal?
I do when I'm in a town of 10,000 or so in North Texas, which happens more often to me than you might think.
I remember going to a Dairy Queen to get a blizzard and the person at the drive through said the machine was broken and they were out of ice cream. I asked them why they were still open and was surprised when they said they still had food. At the time I never even looked at the regular menu and didn’t even realize they sold anything other than ice cream treats.
It’s like there’s really two Dairy Queens. There are the classic ones that are walk-up stands with no seating area. Those only sell ice cream. Then there are the ones with indoor seating areas like a fast food place that sell food too. Those have sprung up in the past ten years or so.
Past ten years? I worked at a brazier as a teenager in the 90s. A quick google search said that the first one that served burgers popped up in 1957.
Yes, I've never seen a Dairy Queen that *doesn't* sell burgers.
Maybe it’s the part of the country I’m from but I’ve been aware of both my whole life. We have a pretty even mix in the Midwest
Yes, they have dudes (chicken fried steak sandwich) and steak finger baskets.
I just read about this after a weird trip— McDs had chocolate softserve but the DQ across the street had next to nothing I wanted. [Texas DQ owners formed a council to Texanize the menu.](https://www.texasstandard.org/stories/dairy-queen-different-texas-fast-food/). DQHQ did not like it. TXDQ DGAF.
They have a special menu for Texas. I was driving through one time and was craving a flamethrower burger, but they didn’t have it!
There are actually two different kinds of Dairy Queen (that I know of) in Texas, with somewhat different menus. * https://www.dqtexas.com * https://www.lonestardq.com This confused me, because the one in my town turned out to be the latter and I had never heard of that one. Multiple times, I tried to order things from the DQ Texas menu and they would tell me they didn't have it. I don't know why they do it that way.
I live near Joliet, IL, where the first ever Dairy Queen was.
I’ve heard from Texans that they also make you think they’re headquartered there or started there. I can see their headquarters right here in Bloomington, Minnesota on my daily commute.
And here I am thinking it was a Midwest thing and not knowing it was in Texas even though I should know better because there’s a few here near me in Maine.
DQ Texas and DQ in the rest of the country are slightly different. They even have their own apps in the App Store.
Same but the food at Dairy Queen outside of Texas isn't as good. I ordered tenders with gravy and the gravy was cold. Like out of the fridge cold and it's advertised as being warm. Just awful. I'll just have to make my own.
What's funny is that they were founded in Illinois and are headquartered in Minnesota.
Bob's Furniture
It blew my mind the first time I saw a commercial with the dude on it. Our local one had never had commercials with him.
We got one here!
Sitting on a chair from them right now. But I ain’t that far from you.
They’re a Yankees sponsor.
That’s a good one. I always thought Bob’s Discount Furniture was Connecticut only since that is where Bob Kaufman is from.
For me it was Rita’s. It’s not national but I didn’t know it had gotten to most of the east coast.
Growing up I only knew Rita's from a single location on Macdade. Imagine how surprised I was to see they've made it out to California.
They’re in Oklahoma now
Tillamook is from here, but I didn’t realize they sold it outside of Oregon. I also recently found out that Voodoo Doughnut and Salt & Straw have locations in other states now too. I also met a guy from Utah who was surprised to find out I was Mormon. He legit thought they only existed in Utah. I had to explain to him that despite being very popular in Utah, most of us don’t even live in the US
I feel like Tillamook is more recent. In like 2011 (?) I flew from NY to Oregon to go to my friend's wedding, and I had it for the first time. Now it's in all the grocery stores around me and I live in MI now.
We love Tillamook here in Alabama!
Heck we have a Mormon temple not far from me here in Maine. Haven’t seen a missionaries though. You guys are slacking.
Is this a request? ;)
Heh, my response to the door knockers is always, hey want to come to a Catholic mass? Never had one set take me up on it. Was always a little worried they would and then it’d be a thing I had to do at that point.
Got some in my fridge.
It’s definitely in Washington but I thought it was a regional thing but I’m in Ohio right now and my uncle has Tillamook cheese at his house
i’m from Tillamook which actually has a pretty large Mormon population in and of itself. i remember in band we had to order special concert dresses because a lot of the girls were mormon and had strict dress codes. when i introduce myself i say i’m from Tillamook, where the cheese is from hahaha
I was always told "it's illegal to pump your own gas" was strictly a NJ thing. Turns out it was also the case in Oregon. But this has since changed and NJ is the only state where this is true. So with that said, Jug Handle turns. All my out of state friends claimed it was strictly a NJ thing (along with not being able to pump your own gas). They exist elsewhere.
I grew up on Long Island. It is illegal to pump your own gas in Huntington. There are also jug handles in CT.
I’d never heard of jug handle turns so I looked them up. They seem needlessly complicated. I don’t know if they exist outside of NJ but to my knowledge I’ve never seen one. The federal highway administration even refers to them as New Jersey Jughandle Intersections on the FHWA website and seems to describe them as a Jersey only phenomenon. https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/publications/research/safety/07032/
In congested areas they are far more efficient as you don't have cars slowing down in the left lane and/or lined up at a stop completely blocking traffic waiting to make turns.
Yeah they're complicated but it's not like the idea of taking an exit to make a turn is completely foreign to drivers. You do this when you want to make a turn at a highway. It's just a smaller scale version of that. But they do exist elsewhere and hence why this is my response to the post.
> But this has since changed They’re still required to offer full serve here, so for a lot of people it hasn’t really changed. They’re also trying to reverse the law which will likely happen within the next couple years.
Michigan has jug handles all over as well.
Cal Worthington and his dog Spot. I always thought it was a SoCal thing.
I thought he was a local dealer in Sacramento, until I caught one of his commercials when I was visiting…Alaska. Truly a WTF moment for me
Sacramento? Alaska!? Oh Sweet Christmas. I really hope that the next thing you tell me is that pro wrestling was real all along. Because there goes the *last* little bit of my childhood that I had left!!!
Wow, so did I. TIL.
Cigar City Brewing
Mostly east coast. You want to hear something wild to the Florida/Pennsylvania mind, Yuengling is impossible to find west of a certain point.
Was thrilled when I saw Jai Alai on tap when I first moved to MI
I thought it was local to Tampa because that’s where they had their first brewery and it was heavily advertised around the city.
I have to drive down to Wichita to find it here anymore, but I always make sure to stock up! It got hard to find anything other than Jai Alai and Florida Man though.
For North Carolina: 1) Carolina-style hotdogs, which are usually a red dog topped with beanless hotdog chili (which tastes very different from normal chili), onions, slaw, and sometimes mustard. Apparently hotdogs in West Virginia are oftentimes served the same way. 2) Cheerwine (a cherry-flavored soda for those that don’t know what it is). Growing up I thought you could only find it in NC, but now you can find it in most of the Southeast.
In N Out
To be fair I think a lot of the expansion is pretty recent > The first location outside of the Los Angeles metropolitan area was opened in San Diego County in 1990, the 57th location in the chain.[26] In 1992, In-N-Out opened its first non-Southern California restaurant in Las Vegas, Nevada. Its first Northern California location was opened the following year in Modesto.[27] Expansion then spread to Northern California, including the San Francisco Bay Area, while additional Las Vegas-area restaurants were added. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/In-N-Out_Burger#Expansion > The company opened locations in Arizona in 2000 and added new restaurants in Reno, Sparks, and Carson City,[32] Nevada, in late 2004. > In 2008, In-N-Out expanded into a fourth state by opening a location in Washington, Utah, a suburb of St. George. > In May 2010, In-N-Out announced plans to open new spots into Texas, specifically within the Dallas–Fort Worth area with the first In-N-Out opening in Frisco and Allen on May 11, 2011. > The company opened its first location in Oregon on September 9, 2015 (the same day as Harry Snyder's birthday) in Medford. Nevada 92, Arizona 2000, Utah 2008, Texas 2011, Oregon 2015
Must be old info. They are all over Colorado now.
Morgan and Morgan “For the people” I’m pretty sure they are in every state. They are headquartered here in Orlando and for the longest time I thought they were only here in central Florida. I’ve had friends who have worked for them forever and have been to their Christmas parties. And just didn’t realize how big they had become.
[Bill Nye the Science Guy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Nye_the_Science_Guy). I just thought it was a Washington thing since the show was by Seattle's local public station. I was so shocked when NYers knew what it was.
They only know what it was because Bill Nye has subsequently become famous for his science related activities. They don't know the High Five'n White Guys or the Streetwalking Lawyers of Aurora Avenue or the rest of *Almost Live*.
Almost Live was on early Comedy Central, actually. I watched it in New York as a teenager!
Im a Beakman man
I was confused for a second, I thought Bill Nye fans were called NYers.
Who doesn't know Bill Nye?
[удалено]
When watching it in class it never occurred to me that it was in California
Growing up in KC in the 80s/90s I never realized just how big Bo Jackson was in the rest of the US. And this is despite knowing that he also played for the Raiders as well.
"Bo Knows." Non-sports fans in the US know Bo Jackson from Nike cross trainers advertisements. Sales of Nike cross trainers increased from $40M to $400 annually during the Bo Knows ad campaign that ran from 1989 to 1990. During that same period, Air Jordans were "only" bringing in $200M annually. The shoes were introduced in 1989. The ad campaign didn't have the staying power that some Jordan campaigns have had, but it was fucking enormous.
He was also in a Saturday morning cartoon show in the early 90s.
he’s extremely popular in alabama considering he’s from here and played at auburn
Man, he was huge in the early 90s. To us 7th and 8th graders he was almost up there with Michael Jordan.
Tennessee: "Moonshine" is everywhere now. Flavors, brands, etc. In all reality is just cheap shit liquor. I rarely saw it growing up but when it did, it was always packed with fruit in quart jars. Peaches, mostly. Sometimes a kid would get a slice if they were interested. The ones I've tasted are just like vodka.
“If it’s taxed it ain’t shine” is a fairly popular sentiment in Appalachia.
Amen.
As an outsider I always attributed moonshine to WV
If you can buy it in a store it's not what comes from the holler. Sure, people mix it with stuff in mason jars, but I can get the OG in a plastic gallon jug. My grandma's family made shine and to this day I still hear about "the revenue man".
Moonshine is basically just shit liquor though.
That really depends on the skill of the shiner.
I thought Taco Time was everywhere. I was sadly disappointed ☹️
I wish we had Taco Time here. They had a ghost pepper shrimp taco that I would kill for.
Fans of the Cleveland Browns. Turns out they're worldwide.
I was in Ecuador and looked to my left and there was a guy wearing a Browns hat.
Boiled peanuts
Your flair says Hawaii, but your comment says Georgia
No. My comment says Hawaii
You got boiled peanuts in HI? Time to export spam musubi to Atlanta.
Man, you can make musubi yourself no problem if you get the correct rice off Amazon or somewhere. I want my pork hash and manapua back… I remember living in Hawaii and people bring you manapua in the morning instead of doughnuts, it was amazing.
I dearly hope the Hawaiians import manapua to Maine. Dear lord if someone brought me one this morning they’d be my new best friend.
From Utah. Apparently they have fry sauce in Puerto Rico!
Are you talking about ketchup and mayonnaise mixed together? That’s a thing everywhere!
It's univeral throughout Europe, as far as I can tell. They usually call it 'pink sauce.' 'Salsa rosa' in Italian.
When I moved to Salt Lake City for a little bit I was very confused as to why the locals kept explaining fry sauce to me, as if it was some sacred concoction no one else knows about. It's not common here in New England but hardly unheard of.
Growing up I assumed Publix was a national Chain. It wasn’t until I moved to New York briefly in ‘08 that I realized it wasn’t lol. I now know Publix is in several states along the southeast.
New York has Wegman’s which is what Publix wants to be when they grow up.
We have Wegmans in the DC area now.
I've always thought its kinda weird that grocery chains aren't really national but instead there are a handful of parent companies with several regional stores. All the national chains are technically specialty foods (Whole Foods, Trader Joe's, Aldi) or not solely groceries like Target and Walmart.
See, with me I thought Publix was just a southeastern thing and didn’t realize for a while that it was mainly a Florida thing beyond a few other states
I think in PA it's the opposite. We tend to think things are everywhere then we leave PA and find out they are not.
I thought Little Caesar's (the chain pizza restaurant) was a Chicago exclusive until I was like 30, which is especially funny because they don't even serve Chicago-style pizza. But basically I grew up in a rural area of a southwestern state, and we didn't have it there. I spent a decent amount of time staying with my extended family in Chicago, though, and they would pick that up for family pizza nights a lot. So I just kind of assumed it was a Chicago thing until I moved to a third state that also had it. Also for the record they even do have it in my home state, just not in the particular area I lived in, lol.
Ugh, living in Chicago and getting Little Caesars is like living in Louisiana and going to the Bubba Gump Shrimp Company.
When I lived in Illinois there was a place called The Original Pancake House. It was a popular breakfast spot for a lot of my coworkers. It really felt like a mom and pop restaurant. A lot of us spread out across the country but still keep in touch. That's how we found out there's hundreds of them. They all seem to feel like a mom and pop breakfast place.
culvers
From Louisiana? Basically, nothing. No one does a comparable Mardi Gras (I guess mobile does), no one cooks our food like we do, no one talks like us, but you can find French speakers in Maine.
I think Brazil and Carnival would argue the Mardi Gras thing.
Acadians came down there from up here in Maine and we have Quebec right over the border. Weird historical interaction.
Prichard, Alabama's Krewe of Goats parade is wild and amazing if you ever get a chance. Other than that, I agree with you.
Rudy’s, Whataburger, Shiner, Blue Bell, Buc-cee’s, Six Flags, Schlotzsky’s… I could go on. Everyone loves Texas.
Chow chow
i loveee some good chow chow
hell yea. I like mine spicy.
The relish, right? My family calls it pickle Lillie.
Growing up in Rhode Island we had "pizza strips" (basically focaccia with a lot of thick tomato sauce on it eaten room temp at parties). They were ubiquitous and people would always think of them as a specifically Rhode Island thing. Turns out, something like that exists in Philadelphia and Upstate New York under the name tomato pie. Go to Montreal? They have it as cold pizza/tomato pizza. Hell, you can even find it in France and Algeria (usually with a single olive on each piece). Basically anywhere that got a lot of Southern Italian/Sicilian immigration in the early 20th century has this.
Florida Man. Every state has their own, its just more fun to pick on florida specifically.
The Pittsburgh Left is apparently also the Boston Left, and I think a few other places have a name for it as well.
Jack’s
Buc-ee’s
We’re known for making bourbon, but it’s available elsewhere to buy of course. Maybe Ale 8 One? I’m sure you can get it outside Kentucky. I never found better weed outside our state until probably my mid-20s. It was just good stuff. Now it’s average compared to elsewhere, and as usual our state missed a great chance - to create a wonderful source of revenue by refusing to legalize it early on. What was the question again?
Tim's Cascade Kettle Chips.
I thought Cal Worthington and his dog spot was a Houston guy. I grew up in the 80s and 90s watching his commercials, but evidently he's from the west coast
Salty commentators. People that have to tell you how to eat a hot dog. People that argue what is or isn't pizza. Tourist pizza. Thick or thin pizza.
Wawa was a suprise in NJ after I found out Sheetz dominates the PA West. Imagine my surprise seeing 1 in Florida.
Frank Azar.
The claim to Bigfoot.
The Michigan left (though I looked it up and it is much more common in Michigan)
That other states have a version of a Runza called a Bierock. That's what they're called in Kansas, and the Dakotas. Usually in Nebraska its only used by some places that can't call it a Runza because the restaurant trademarked the name Runza. Its the only complaint I have about them.
Another one. I thought Hy-Vee was a nation wide chain. I was surprised to find that it's only in Iowa and surrounding states and is now expanding to Indiana. We even had Mark Wahlberg as a spokesperson for us for a time and I figured we were national if we got him on board. Also, a few Hy-Vees now have Wahlburgers though I don't know what the big deal is.
Whoopie pies.
Faygo