Y’all’ is something that can be officially dropped for 30 years, business environments for instance, but doesn’t ever disappear from casual conversation. It is regional and a tell but rarely outgrown.
Gives you a little more leeway in sentence structure and unlike colloquialisms like ‘woke’ is free to all.
‘He gained 20 IQ points at the altar’ is one of the better ones I’ve ever heard. Might be specific to Texas, maybe not. Haven’t run into it anywhere else.
“Pau” is very common in HI for done; “all pau”? Meaning “Are you all finished?” It’s particularly used in connection with food and being done eating.
Looks like that was a Hawaiian word http://wehewehe.org/gsdl2.85/cgi-bin/hdict?a=d&d=D17364
I have a friend who says, “the devil is beating his wife” if there is a sun shower. I wonder what the origin of that one is!
Texas: ‘Put it up’ meaning put it away or to the right place. First time I heard it, I thought they wanted me to put something on a shelf. And ‘fix’n’ to do something, as in going to do something.
Pittsburgh area: ‘yinz’ the equivalent of ‘y’all’ in the south. H had no idea what I was saying.
He has so many ‘demons to deal with’. Is this regional? Heard it a lot lately.
I’m from Southern California and have never spent any significant amount of time in the South but I find myself starting to use the phrase “you all” (two separate words). I am making a concerted effort to wean myself from saying “you guys” and “you all” is naturally coming out of my mouth as a substitute. Using “you” alone as a plural, though gramatically correct, doesn’t feel comfortable in my mouth.
The phrase I notice my Texas friends saying is “all y’all.”
“Y’all” seems to be used for the singular (although it is obviously plural on its face) and “all y’all” for the plural.
I don’t think that “demons you have to deal with” (or “dealing with your demons” or similar) is regional, personally. It just seems like a general idiom.
“Wide open” = any time, nothing on my schedule. West coast.
“Go home you’re drunk” = a person did something really stupid/silly/illogical that would only make sense when you’re drunk
“Let’s blow this joint” is the variation of popsicle stand I’ve grown up with.
“Bless your heart” my boss is from the south, he says it a lot. It’s an insult when it comes out of his mouth
Yes sir/yes ma’am: I’m in customer service. If you were born after 1980 you don’t get sir’d/ma’am’d. Old folks (especially anyone wearing something that signifies they’re a veteran) are the only ones who get yes sir/yes ma’am where I mean it with genuine respect. For everyone else it’s just an easy way to address a stranger. Obviously I’m not southern.
Another one I like is chill/chillax
One I learned in CC that I love, “Not my monkeys, not my circus,” especially when it’s a situation that is becoming a slow train wreck but I’m not in charge.
I also like “Pono,” which is a Hawaiian word and I believe it is right, just, balanced.
Ha! My very Southern grandmother used to say “the devil is beating his wife behind the kitchen door.” Now, how did THAT phrase come about? Who knew that Satan had a kitchen?!
I’m a born and bred Southerner who has lived in the Midwest for 30+ years, and I’m not an uneducated hick. (I’m on CC!) I still say y’all in casual speech. It’s a very handy word.
Finally - of course “bless your/his/her heart” can be both snarky and sincere. The trick is being able to tell which is which. Of course, it’s most effective when it’s meant both ways at the same time.
Of course, at least until recently, many folks in other parts of the country regarded Southerners ipso facto as uneducated hicks. I would like to think that is changing. That may be why some of us react so strongly to remarks, that were never meant to be offensive, in these types conversations.
Catahoula is absolutely right folks may use different speech in different settings. There are a multitude of reasons for that. You have to be at least not totally dim to adjust your language for specific audiences. And yes, “y’all” is inclusive 
I really embrace the Southern Gothic stereotype, but it made my parents and their friends absolutely furious. And I surely understand why.
eta: Faulkner’s V.K Ratliff (Snope’s Trilogy) is the smartest guy in the story, but no formal education. I know a lot of these men and women.
As a child, my grandmother lived in Hawaii and so picked up Hawaiian terms, which she used back in NYC, bringing up my Mom. So my Mom went to school one day and instead of hurry up, said “wiki wiki” to someone, and could not understand why everyone looked at her like she was babbling.
I use Dude way too much. I blame The Big Lebowski movie.
I’m not allowed to use “on fleek” or “rachet” per order of my daughters. “Rachet” equates to a hot mess.
“No worries” is my favorite thing to say, because “it’s fine” never actually means that. In fact, the way I can tell someone in my family is mad is if the word “fine” is returned in response to a question. No Worries feels genuine to me.
The D’s have had boyfriends who use “Yes Ma’am and Yes Sir”. It gets tiring when you’re talking to them and they respond every.single.time. with “Yes ma’am”-it stunts the conversation. I am cool with it in response to a single query, but in the context of a multi-sentence conversation, it becomes artificial and I definitely get the at-arm’s-length feeling, which is probably deliberate (hey lady stop interrogating me!).
Yes.
I use “y’all” a lot as an Atlanta resident of 25 years, but since I don’t have a southern accent it comes out “you all”. I can’t bottom out my vowels well enough to get that apostrophe right, so I don’t try. I’ve barely gotten my “r’s” back into words! (Grew up south of boston).
Sometimes I’ll quote Ferris Bueller: “that’s so choice”.
I’ve never heard y’all used in the singular. I’ve heard people say they hear it that way. Maybe some people do use it in singular but as I said I have never heard it
The fact that people say “all y’all” (which I have said) does not mean that y’all is singular. Quite the opposite. All is generally used with plural words. All of y’all is everyone. Some of y’all is only part of the group. You say “all y’all” just like you’d say “all of them.”
In the Cincinnati area, “please?” is often used instead of “what?” As in … if you don’t hear exactly what someone said, you might reply “please?”.
I lived there for several years and thought that “please?” was a nicer alternative to “what?” or “what did you say?”
Marylanders say they are going “Down the Ocean” when they mean they are going to Maryland’s eastern shore (like Ocean City). There’s a lot of other things people say differently here and there, but you’ve got to hear them. (for example, pixture rather than picture)
Growing up in NY, people in Queens and/or Brooklyn talk about going ‘to the island’ when they are in fact already on that island. (What did you do this weekend? We went to the island to visit my roommate.)
I grew up in the south so grew up saying y’all, now living in the midwest I tend to say you all.
I had a friend in college who when he would offer to drive me some where would say “would you like me to carry you there”
I love “not my circus, not my monkeys” and also the expression “I had one nerve left and he/she was on it”
In Michigan everyone knows that going “Up North” means going to Northern Michigan for a vacation.
One of my southern friends uses bless his/her heart- she seems to say it in a situation where you would have sympathy for someone else, like “Oh that’s too bad” or “I’m sorry to hear that”. Next time I see her I’ll have to ask her if she ever uses it in a snarky way.
For those of you of German descent, what about “mach schnell” (=make haste, hurry up)? What you’d say to someone who is dawdling.
Does anyone here say “That’s a fine how do you do”? My husband never heard of it, and when I think about it I don’t hear others say it. I assume I picked it up from my mom but where did she get it? (She’s lived all over the country and world. )