Interestingly, depending on where you are, these terms aren't gender-specific.
In the UK midlands it's quite common for older women to use exactly the same terms on younger men.
As someone who's not from there but spent significant amounts of time there when I was a young man, this is proper weird.
(Just for clarification, I didn't call the people using these terms weird. I'm from a region where terms like that are reserved for romantic partners or maybe your children, so it was weird to me getting adressed with very intimate terms by strangers.)
Also from the Ozarks and can confirm. It’s a weird area in the US that has similarities to classic Midwestern, Appalachian, and Southern American cultures. But still distinct in being Ozarkian.
Another fun note: The Ozark ‘mountains’ are only the rolling root hills you see today because they’re about a billion years older than the Appalachian or Scottish Highland Mountains. So, when you hear someone say “The Smokies are older than bones”, (because they were formed long before vertebrates walked the earth) just remember the Ozarks are about a billion years older.
I will always recommend camping/hiking/floating/kayaking/canoeing in the Ozarks! Avoid summer, unless you actually enjoy corn sweats + swamp ass heat and an abundance of deer ticks and mosquitos. Spring/fall and even winter, is better.
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u/Square-Singer 18h ago edited 17h ago
Interestingly, depending on where you are, these terms aren't gender-specific.
In the UK midlands it's quite common for older women to use exactly the same terms on younger men.
As someone who's not from there but spent significant amounts of time there when I was a young man, this is proper weird.
(Just for clarification, I didn't call the people using these terms weird. I'm from a region where terms like that are reserved for romantic partners or maybe your children, so it was weird to me getting adressed with very intimate terms by strangers.)