What do you call that carbonated beverage you drink ?
Here’s a map showing what the popular term is throughout the country:
I grew up in the Northeast so for me, it was always soda. I’m not even sure I heard the word “pop” used to describe a carbonated drink until I met my wife, who spent most of her life in Ohio. And don’t even ask me to explain how the word “Coke” came to describe everything from actual Coca-Cola to an orange soda.
H/T: Andrew Sullivan
Grew up calling every brown carbonated drink a “Coke”. In order to get a Coke, you must say Coca-Cola. This might be because most Texans consider Dr Pepper their pop/soda/coke of choice.
Example of conversation with waiter-
Waiter: What would you like to drink?
Customer: I’ll have a coke.
Waiter: What kind of coke?
Customer: Dr Pepper, of course…what else is there???
Frankly, I just find stuff like this fascinating.
Even in a nation of 300 million mostly connected people, there are still regional differences like this….and I don’t think they’re going to go away.
My wife has lived in Virginia for more than 3 years now, and, for her, it’s still pop. I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to change that
Where I grew up in suburban Boston in the 1950s, it was “tonic”. When we’d visit my grandparents in Michigan and ask for a tonic, my grandfather would produce a tube of Brylcreem. “Is this what you want?”, he’d ask. I failed to see the humor.