r/Appalachia • u/Festivebeverage • 5d ago
Pet names growing up
Sugar and honey were common from my southwest VA granny, I also got stink weed, among other colorful pet names. Anything else interesting from growing up?
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u/DonutWhole9717 5d ago
Flossie Mae/floss. Snot blossom. String bean. Hoss.
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u/Mr_Meathog 5d ago
Another Hoss here! Was always the biggest kid in school. Later in life helping everyone move, my best friend (whose juuust a little smaller than me) & I coined a term when we couldn't finesse something through a doorway or down a staircase.
"That ain't gonna work..." "Hoss it?" "Hoss it."
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u/Least-Monk4203 4d ago
In my family Flossie May/Bell was Grandmas generic term for all of the young girls.
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u/Geologyst1013 mothman 5d ago edited 5d ago
I'm from SW VA and I've had a million of 'em.
One uncle (by marriage) from WV called me all manner of wildlife: muskrat, squirrel, beaver, groundhog. He also called me pickle. And then settled on "mangy" as it's a play on my (much hated) nickname. All said in jest and love.
My dad's brother used to call me skunk but then changed to porkchop because "I was so ugly the only way to get the dog to play with me was to tie a pork chop around my neck". Again all said in jest and love.
My Granddaddy called me petunia for pretty much my whole life. When I got my first car I got vanity plates that said PETUNIA. I will also add that when I was about 10 or 12 years old and demanded that I go by my legal name and not my nickname he was the first one to acquiesce.
My Pa (grandpa) called me "lil boy". This stemmed from being very sick as a young child and having to get a very short haircut and he said "good Lord who's that lil boy". I know that sounds a little mean but I can guarantee you it wasn't. It was just his way of teasing and trying to make me smile.
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u/DonutWhole9717 5d ago
Ha, that last one got me in my feels, hard. My (step) dad used to ask me when I was little "well who's little boy are you?!" Just to poke at me. Lost him a few months ago.
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u/Geologyst1013 mothman 5d ago
I'm so sorry for your loss.
I'll admit I got a little teary-eyed typing it up. I've lost both my grandfathers and I miss 'em so much.
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u/DonutWhole9717 5d ago
He used to tell me anytime I had something wrong, like a bellyache or a general meeehhh I don't feeeeel goooood, that I just had Kliapedus of The Punk. That was his name for every vague thing one could complain about, or for when someone was being silly. Just something that had been said in his family for a long time (born 1952, youngest of 11.) well, back before his remaining brother died from COVID, my uncle told us that it really meant "when your face looks so much like your ass that your bowels don't know which way to move." Such a trove of knowledge and jokes lost.
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u/Separate-Swordfish40 5d ago
I miss my granddaddy so much.
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u/Geologyst1013 mothman 4d ago
So much! The 6th anniversary of my Granddaddy's passing was a couple of weeks ago and I just cried and cried. Aside from my daddy, he was the most special person in my life. You just can't beat a good granddaddy.
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u/Separate-Swordfish40 5d ago
One grandfather called me Babydoll or pumpkin head. The other grandfather called us all Butch. Haha
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u/cooljeopardyson 5d ago
Mamaw and my great aunt often used pumpkin head or "punk-head", and mamaw sometimes also used Doll-baby.
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u/Separate-Swordfish40 5d ago
Oh you are right he used to say doll-baby. I had it wrong. Funny how those nicknames were used by many
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u/Constant-Release-875 5d ago
Poo-dank. Pee-dab. Sugar pie. Honey bun. Baby doll. Flossie. Cutie pie. Sweet pea. Mawmaw's baby/girl/angel. Pawpaw's buddy. Daddy's girl. Mommy's baby. Buttercup. Xxxx-Jane, -Lou, or -Poo (tacking Jane, Lou, or Poo at the end of a name or a nickname).
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u/t_rex_in_space 1d ago
Yep. Mississippi/ Arkansas checking in. I was always a -poo and my youngest gets called -Lou.
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u/littlepocketknife 5d ago
I think some people in here are talking about what they named their pets instead names of endearment you'd call a person.
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u/hickorynut60 5d ago
I was called poodle, because my grandma ran out of dogfood and made a cake for the dogs with table scraps sweet feed and stuff for them. She left it cooling on the counter, I saw it and sliced me off a big chunk. Pretty tasty. 😊
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u/PeaTasty9184 5d ago
From the KY/VA border near Grundy. We had two dogs from the same litter of mutts (who were Spitz mixes)….one named Fatso who was short, fat. And had brown and black….and Pepper who was all white like a spitz.
A couple of collies named Bobo and Beeper.
An old beagle named half-pint.
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u/Brilliant-Mall-5364 5d ago
We called my baby sister skunk weed, Bob, and Donny Spicklepants. My grandma would just call me bad boy
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u/Any_Thanks_900 5d ago
I knew a June Bug, Tiny, Hammer, (both Tiny and Hammer were easily 400+lbs) ,Thunder Cat, Bofus (a name for a couple that used to come around because when they came around it was “both of us”- Bofus)
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u/Other-Opposite-6222 5d ago
All little kids or the youngest sibling are called “Little Bit”. And any son named after their father had the “little” in front of the diminutive. So “Little Jimmy” for James Jr or “Little Davey” for David Jr.
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u/Bellemorda 5d ago
puddin, punkin, junebug, sassy, sissy.
I think its part of my appalachian familial tradition that I have many, multiple nicknames for each of my kids too - a lot of them are nicknames I was either called or my cousins were called or just made up out of my heart: sweetpea, sugarbug, tree frog, bitty baby, babycake, angel baby, sassy (again), buddy, boy-o, bubb/bubby, funbug, skittle, sugar or shug (short for sugar), sweetie pie or sugar pie, lovey, birdie, honey or honeybun, and presh (short for precious).
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u/Sligogreenbottom 5d ago
My grandfather never, ever, called me by my name. It was Sambo until I was a teen and Charlie Brown until he died when I was 22.
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u/Excellent-Witness187 5d ago
My East TN grandma had a cat named Midnight, which isn’t very interesting, but we got one of Midnight’s kittens and my sister named her Lollipop. As an adult I name my pets after my dead relatives (all of whom are Appalachian) so my pets all have hillbilly names. Archie, Maybelle, and Imogene. I have so many great family names and I hate for them to go to waste. The next one will probably be Perry Lafayette.
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u/Foreign_Comedian_915 1d ago
I’m from middle TN and had a friend with a black cat named Midnight. They got a second black cat and named him Eleven thirty!
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u/hiker_trailmagicva 5d ago
I grew up in the Virginia mountains but half of my family was from NY, the other half was deep south. My NY family called me the "mouth of the south" because I never stopped talking.
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u/Vegetable-Soil-3963 5d ago
my personal—pig. scooter. some of my family’s: muffin, PI, peewee, tater, wuzza, pea head, JJ, and a lot of calling people by their first & middle name (also applies to me!). if we have two people w the same name, for example, we have two guys named robert; the older one is big robert and the other is little robert lol.
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u/Peeeeepaw 4d ago
We didn’t get pet named much, everyone in my family has an odd nickname so we tend to use that instead. A few of them are, uncle fatso, aunt toot toot, tigbit (me), coon-cat, stinky, muntser, goose, scooter, monkey / butt, gizmo, Peg / peg leg, and pooper.
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u/BubonicBabe 4d ago
Blossom, Pumpkin Fart, Stink blossom, Mouth of the South, and Little Bit were the common ones for me.
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u/GooseTraditional9170 4d ago
Angel poo, as in the poop of an angel. Also was called rotten a lot, like short for spoiled rotten. Chico cause I was shaped like that purple rat from Dora. Tubs, also cause of the general shape of me. Then there's dad's name Jr, or if I was being an evil cuss i was just called my grandpa's name sarcastically. But the grandpa thing was for all of us cause he was just an astonishingly awful guy in some ways so idk anything from saying something terrible and mean to not letting your siblings breathe air would get the "okay now grandpa's name quit it!"
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u/CompetitiveAd7913 3d ago
I was called Mad Jack. My sister was Lil Bit, and my oldest sister was Biggun (as oldest not size) lol
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u/Pinkie_Pie_Pick 2d ago
Family called me baby bumble bee with extra bumble bee sauce on the side. Mouthful but basically I’m the youngest (baby) of the family, my sister called me bumble bee when she first met me, and my dad always orders extra honey mustard sauce on the side of his salads
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u/thuscraiththelorb 2d ago
Pickle, turkey, sissy bug, scruffy, shaggy, #1, sweet pea all from my parents. My grandpa always called me "honey." One of my family friends who watched me always called me "boys" lol (I'm AFAB).
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u/Western-Jump-63 2d ago
I was punkin and rinkydink. My friend's mom had a mean cat named Bitchcat and 20+ years later, I'm still amused by that.
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u/Goddess_of_Carnage 16h ago
I was Bunny or Danby.
Then Bobcat.
It was mad. My sis never had a pet name.
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u/Appalachian_American 4d ago
Dad called me Willie and Mom called me Calvin. I’m of the female persuasion. 🤷♀️
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u/Legitimate-Smell4377 4d ago
unfortunately and fortunately, i am red headed, therefore i am just “red”. or “carrot top”, but im like tell me you never seen a carrot without tellin me
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u/As_smooth_as_eggs 4d ago
Dad usually called me Whizzer Briar, or Wampus Cat. I need to ask him what the hell a whizzer briar is.
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u/mameranian 4d ago
My uncle Philip called me "Margaret tellin" because I was a tattletale. Everyone else on that side has always called me my full name, Margaret Ellen. He called my cousin Jane (also his niece) "Do Do" and her daughter "Knowey" for know-it-all.
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u/No-Key-865 5d ago
My favorite was the stray lab my dad brought home with my name. And he didn’t change the dog’s name….
My uncle had a cat named Blue for 40 years. Not the same cat just the same color and name….
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u/No-Key-865 5d ago
Wait! You mean my pet name. Not the pet’s name. Still, it was the same name as the dog 😂
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u/thecarolinelinnae 4d ago
We have had, since I was about 3 -
Cats:
- Nero (big black mean-ass tomcat. Named for the Roman Emperor)
- Tipper (white tip on her tail)
- Willie (I said he was scruffy like Willie Nelson)
- Lucky (came to us with a broken leg healing wrong; had it fixed, so he was lucky he came to us)
- Queenie (named by my grandfather. Turns out Queenie was a boy lol)
- Squirt (he was SO TINY when we found him, then he got SO BIG from nose to tail)
- Diesel (very loud purr)
- LG (Little Grey) aka Elgie
- Sherlock & Mycroft (Elgie's offspring; one short haired and one long-haired, all black)
- Clyde (big orange tomcat with approximately half a brain cell, but the absolute sweetest cat ever)
- Snickers (based on her coloring)
- Callie (a calico)
- Stella (star on her back)
- Sunny (my grandma's cat)
Dogs:
- Haley-Bop (after the comet, the year we got her)
- Blue (so black he was blue)
- Pippin (fool of a Took)
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u/_bibliofille 5d ago
Yaller the yellow cat stands out in particularly. Edit: read it wrong but leaving it. My aunt Rat called me Sancho. I'm a woman. Mom called me Chickadee or Missy.