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Here is “Round 30 ” of your insights into how to know if someone is from North Carolina. You may also want to check out

• Round One (February 2004)
• Round Two (March 2004)
• Round Three (May 2004)
• Round Four (July 2004)
• Round Five (August 2004)
• Round Six (September 2004)
• Round Seven (November 2004)
• Round Eight (January 2005)
• Round Nine (February 2005)
• Round Ten (March 2005)
• Round Eleven (April 2005)
• Round Twelve (May 2005)
• Round Thirteen (June 2005)
• Round Fourteen (August 2005)
• Round Fifteen (September 2005)
• Round Sixteen (October 2005)
• Round Seventeen (November 2005)
• Round Eighteen (December 2005)
• Round Nineteen (January 2006)
• Round Twenty (February 2006)
• Round Twenty-one (March 2006)
• Round Twenty-two (April 2006)
• Round Twenty-three (May 2006)
• Round Twenty-four (June 2006)
• Round Twenty-five (July 2006)
• Round Twenty-six (August 2006)
• Round Twenty-seven (September 2006)
• Round Twenty-eight (October 2006)
• Round Twenty-nine (November 2006)

If you can think of anything to add to this list, send it to us:

E-mail: Carolina.country@ncemcs.com
Mail: P.O. Box 27306, Raleigh, NC 27611.
Phone: (919) 875-3062.

From Tommy Stallings, Belvidere

• You install security lights on your house and garage, then leave both unlocked.
• You have only five spices: salt, pepper, Texas Pete, Tabasco and ketchup.
• The local papers cover national and international news on one page, but require six pages for local gossip and sports.
• You know all four seasons: Almost Summer, Summer, Still Summer and Christmas.
• Going to Wal-Mart is a favorite past time known as “goin’ Wal-Martin’.”
• You don’t need driver’s ed. If your mama says you can drive, you can drive.

From Lori Locklear, Maxton

• You cook guinea and rice instead of chicken and rice.
• You find out your wife is your
  second cousin and no one cares.
• Your mama asks you to walk over yonder to fetch some eggs from your neighbor who lives two miles down the dirt road.
• Your Grandpa borrows your Grandmama’s teeth to eat an ear of corn.

From Janice Mobley, Pink Hill

• You leave your summer and winter clothes mixed up in your closets.
• You hear a siren and go out on the front porch to listen and see whose house it’s at, then call them to see what’s going on up there.
• Your father-in-law has pigs named Pork Chop and Ham Hock, turkeys named Thanksgiving and Christmas, and a dog named Butterbean.
• Your husband’s friends come by and see the new animal ornaments in your yard and say, “Oh boy! New targets!”

From Cotisha White, Edenton

• At night around 10:30 or 11 either your mama or papa sits in a chair in front of TV and starts nodding.
• You have a Kool-Aid pitcher and a tea pitcher.
• You walk out your back door and see farm land.
• You wait for all the tires on your car to go bad before you get new ones.
• Nobody sits in the living room except the people from your church or your job.
• You and your neighbor share a clothesline.

From Krista Spivey, Dallas

• You and your boyfriend go on a date riding a combine and looking at soybean fields.
• Your favorite meat is deer jerky.
• Your Mawmaw insists that you eat something green during a meal.
• Your favorite meal is an ear of corn, a mater sandwich and a slice of cucumber.
• The only clothes you wear are Wrangler and Carhartt.
• You have a head-to-toe camouflage outfit.
• You’ve pushed your best friend’s four-wheeler out of the mud.

From Beverly Long, Hertford

• You call tomatoes “tomaders.”
• You spend your Fourth of July
  diggin’ taters.
• Your grandparents say they’ll be here “prednigh.”
• You have deer and bear in your backyard.
• You have a barn or a shop mainly just to party in.

From Carolyn Hager, Polkville

• You can buy livermush and barbeque slaw at your local store.
• You pronounce Rutherfordton “Refton.”
• You’re at a picnic where homemade tomato soup and cornbread is all there is to eat.

From Gwendolyn Holmes, Youngsville

• After a good meal, you say, “I’m stuffed as a bullfrog.”
• Your community has at least one big mouth know-it-all.
• About 90 percent of your church is your family.
  
• You’re eating an animal with pellets or buckshot in it and your daddy says, “Just eat ‘round it.”
• At family reunions you meet cousins you didn’t know you had.
  
• When you visit a city or a foreign location you don’t like it, “not one bit.”
• Your grandparents consider “dang” bad language.
• You use leftover Halloween pumpkins for target practice.

From Bobbie Jo Allen, Lexington

• Your children live over the hill and through the woods to Grandma’s house.
• Your family, both sets of grandparents and great-granny all live on the same big hunk of land which PaPaw swears you better never sell because “ya ain’t never gonna find another piece a land like it.”
• On summer days you wait for Grandma to get done runnin’ the summer school bus route so we can all come over and eat watermelon (fresh from Papaw’s garden) and homemade ice cream.
• You can count on at least one phone call during the winter saying, “Don’t turn your water on for a couple hours ‘cause Papaw’s workin’ on the well in the pump house.”
• When you go to PaPaw Bob’s for breakfast your kids have to pick all his ripe strawberries before they go in and climb on the John Deere.
• You’re driving to town and you’re behind a tractor or a pick-up that has a bumper sticker that reads: “Tobacco bought this truck.”

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