You know you're from Southern Illinois if...

1. You have never met a celebrity, and don't even know what "one are."
2. Your idea of a traffic jam is four cars waiting to pass a tractor on the highway.
3. You eat "okry" rather than okra.
4. You eat "taters" and "maters" rather than potatoes and tomatoes
5. Cornbread and sorghum are dietary staples.
6. Biscuits and gravy make a breakfast, lunch, or dinner.
7. You still think that chicken and dumplin's are a Sunday luxury.
8. You feel guilty that you bought a pumpkin for Halloween rather than growing it yourself.
9. You feel guilty that you don't have a milk cow.
10. You remember what mountain oysters and chitins are, and would like to have some.
11. Oysters are something that come from hogs, not the sea.
12. You still believe that the only good snake is a dead snake.
13. Your parents and grandparents always said, "Watch for snakes!" each time you headed for the woods.
14. You drink "sodie water" rather than pop.
15. You eat "ro'snears" rather than corn on the cob.
16. You greet visitors by yelling "Well, get out!" (meaning get out of your car and visit a while.)
17. You yell "Come back!" right after telling your visitors bye (pronounced "bha")
18. And you precede both "Get out!" and "Come back" with "You'uns."
19. When granpa installed the shower in the new bathroom, he took a "shar-bath" rather than a shower.
20. The old men of the family just couldn't get used to taking a dump "right in the house!"
21. The new bathroom was for the women, but the men still went outdoors.
22. The family "car" is a pickup.
23. Saturday is "the" day you go to town to buy nails, salt, shells, etc.
24. "Shells" mean shotgun shells, not seashells.
25. "Bullets" mean cartridges, not little marks at the beginning of a line of text on a page.
26. A "new" family car or truck has to be at least five years old.
27. Your children and grandchildren had to be born three counties away or in another state.
28. Seriously injured accident victims have to be air-lifted to another state.
29. You still wave at people passing in cars and trucks.
30. You still nod and say "Howdy" to strangers in town.
31. But you still regard strangers with suspicion when they come around the home place.
32. You regard all strangers who come around as possible "government men."
33. All visitors are welcome as long as they don't appear to be government men.
34. Visits from "Government men" (though they are treated kindly), are not considered good omens.
35. You're not sure why, but you consider all "government men" as potentially dangerous agents of an alien power.
36. State Police are government men too, but at least they show up in uniform, so you know who they are.
37. You don't consider the sheriff a government man – unless he comes from up north or back east.
38. You consider "up north" as an alien and cold place where a lot of people used to go to find jobs.
39. When you were "up north" home was "down home."
40. If you ever went very far south, home was never "up north," it was in Southern Illinois – with stress on "Southern."
41. If anybody says, "Ah, that was a pretty rough neck of the woods a few years back," it makes you feel proud.
42. You don't think of Chicago or Springfield as being part of Illinois.
43. If you do admit that Chicago and Springfield are in Illinois, you know that's what's gone wrong with the state.
44. You find it insulting, and acutely embarrassing, when southerners call you a "Yankee."
45. You don't pronounce the 'S' in Illinois like the rest of the world.
46. You think everyone from north of Mt. Vernon and Vincennes talk funny.
47. You still call the highway "the hard road."
48. A cliff is a "bluff" and creek isn't a crick.
49. You measure distance in minutes – whether on the hard road, straight through the woods, or along the branch.
50. You feel the change of address from "Rural Route" to numbers and a road name is a sign of government oppression.
51. You suspect that the 911 system had something to do with the collapse of the World Trade Center Towers.
52. The word "vacation" still evokes visions of hard work (and good times), in the hay fields.
53. A family vacation means maybe going to Six Flags.
54. You know that if you get lost in the woods, all you have to do is go down into the "holler" and "foller" the "branch" (creek).
55. You give directions by hill names, home place names, fence rows, and big white oak trees.
56. Everybody you know has hit at least one deer.
57. You consider bootlegger Charlie Birger as a folk hero rather than a gangster.
58. You feel guilty going to the store for meat when there's still plenty of rabbits, squirrels, and deer around.
59. You feel guilty buying vegetables because you "ort to'ave put in a bigger garden, or put more up" (canned more).
60. You feel guilty because you "ort t'ave planted more fruit trees" in the orchard fifteen years ago.
61. You still make home brew because you think it's "ag'in the law."
62. You still know someone who operates a still "Cause it's ag'in the law."
63. You naturally know that all "white lightn'en" comes from "somewh'ar over in Kentucky."
64. You still feel guilty because you don't always go to church on "of-ah Sunday."
65. Your school classes were canceled because of the threat of a one inch snow.
66. Your school classes were canceled because of heat.
67. You have had to switch from 'heat' to 'A/C' all in the same day (if you had them).
68. You know what's knee-high by the Fourth of July.
69. Stores don't have bags, they have sacks.
70. You end your sentences with an unnecessary preposition. For example: "Where's my coat at?"
71. When your grandmother guessed, she "reckoned" and when she knew she "declared."
72. Your grandma used snuff, because she'd sworn off of tobacco and smashed up her clay pipe.
73. Half the "old folks" (family), were born and raised in log homes.
74. Your first ambition was to have a log cabin in the woods.
75. And you never considered becoming president.
76. Most of your family and friends who have a house, built it themselves.
77. All the festivals across the state are named after a fruit, vegetable, grain, flower, fish, or an animal.
78. You installed security lights on your house and garage and leave both unlocked.
79. You shot out your security lights because you figured out that they provide noctural thieves with outdoor lighting.
80. You put o'l and gayce in your pickup.
81. You carry jumper cables and a set of mechanic tools in your pickup or car.
82. The local paper covers national and international news on one page but requires 6 pages for sports and auction notices.
83. You think that deer season is a national holiday.
84. You concede that deer season and "hunters from Chicago" are necessary to bring money to the area and then the deer herd.
85. You consider thinning the deer herd as a convenient means of making the roads a little safer to travel.
86. You stay out of the woods during deer season, and only hunt when it's safe again.
87. You know which leaves make a good toilet paper.
88. You find -20 degrees F "a little chilly."
89. You know the 4 seasons as: Almost Winter, Winter, Still Winter and Construction.
90. You believe that "Egypt" is the Promised Land of milk and honey, and call it home.
91. You know that the name "Egypt" came from the Bible, but have only recently heard there's still a foreign country by that name.
92. You know that Shawneetown was the state's first great metropolis.
93. You are proud that Cave-in-Rock was once occupied by river pirates, horse thieves, and counterfeiters.
94. Whenever anyone mentions going out for a steak, the first thing you think of is the neighbor's beef herd.
95. You consider yourself lucky if you have a functioning septic tank.
96. You feel a little guilty that you signed up for "city water."
97. You feel that being connected to the water line is like living too close to town.
98. You also know more than one family that still uses an outhouse.
99. You remember what a smoke house is.
100. You pronounce the invisible 'R' in the word wash.
101. You capitalize the 's' in Southern Illinois.
102. You suspect that the wrong side might have won the Civil War and Southern Illinois ought to be a separate state.
103. You consider the State Police as an alien law enforcement agency.
104. You know what a burn barrel is, and use it (and don't know it's against the law).
105. You hold that ignorance of the law is a damned good excuse to ignore it.
106. You know that there are far too many laws to memorize, so why pretend to know any of them?
107. You have painted a seatbelt stripe diagonally across the back window of the pickup to fool the oppressors.
108. Your richest relative just bought a mobile home which is "almost new!"
109. The only opera you've heard of, or listened to, is the Grand Ole Opry.
110. You're a man and your wife is the only breadwinner ("'Cause farmin' don't pay, and the mines is shut down").
111. You're a woman and you still have to cook when you get home from work.
112. You have your job application in at three coal mines, the Cave-in-Rock ferry, and half a dozen prisons.
113. Nobody has called you for an interview, and it's been "nigh on ten years now!"
114. You know you could get a job as a trucker, but don't want to travel too far from the home place.
115. You pray that the county will get a new prison so there will at least be a few new jobs.
116. You are proud of the Shawnee National Forest, but consider the Forest Service an alien law enforcement agency.
117. You hope to spot a "catimount" (catamount - mountain lion), but fear running into the Game Warden or Forest Ranger.
118. You know that tourism somehow boosts the local economy, but have never seen any evidence of the boost.

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