FRIDAY SURPRISE: "You can change the name of a rose, but you can't do nothin' 'bout the smell!"

With credit to Andy Griffith for the title!

So, if you go to your local prepared food emporium and order a long sandwich, what do you ask for - a sub, a hoagy, a grinder, a hero, or something else? This is just one of the many cultural differences one finds traveling across the United States.

There are others, and none as surprisingly contentious as the word used to refer to a carbonated soft drink. "Pop", "soda", "coke" (used generically) all indicate strong regional preferences. Believe it or not, some people research this stuff and make maps of their findings.



Take a gander at the large version of the map, and look at my native state of Oregon. We're one of the more consistent areas in the whole country, showing a distinct preference for the term "pop." (We're 'blue' in more ways than one, sadly, but things around here are still far better than in our southern neighbor's backyard.)

Anyhow, as I was studying the map and gloating about our agreement on the word "pop", I noticed an anomaly. Not a small one; a significant one. Wheeler county, in the north-central portion of the state, is solidly in the dark green indicating "other."

Huh? How'd that happen? I think I can explain.

Wheeler county is on the dry side of the state. Not 'dry' as in alcohol consumption, but 'dry' in the sense that it doesn't get much precipitation. (For those who don't know, Oregon - despite having a reputation as a rainy state - is darn near two-thirds desert. Everything east of the Cascades, with only a few exceptions, gets very little rain.) It's also a rugged county, full of canyons and rimrock. It's beautiful country, really, but a scary kind of beauty. This combination makes for desolation; not many people live in Wheeler County.


(Oregon State Archives photo)

Now, Wheeler is one of our smaller counties. Still, it's 75% larger than the entire state of Rhode Island, and within spitting distance of the size of Delaware. In all that area, only 1,600 people live. That's right - less than two thousand people live in the entire county.

With such a small population, it's likely that only one of them responded to the soft drink survey. The map tells us the person in question cannot be a native - more likely, a transplant from a state where they refer to carbonated soft drinks by some other term. If this is allowed to spread, our whole state could turn green before our very eyes!

Then again, Oregon is known for being green, which attracts pink, which results in voting blue, which turns me purple. Clear?

-=[ Grant ]=-

P.S.: I found this over at the Strange Maps blog. It's a fun place to explore.

Tags: oregon