As a Southerner who had the unfortunate experience of living in New England for 7 long years, let me agree w/the lady from Illinois: indeed, they DO think the universe revolves around them (especially my mother-in-law). I never heard the pronunciation "ahnt" or "awnt" (except from the African-American community) till I moved to this cold and snooty place. Then I had to laugh because my mother-in-law couldn't understand why my daughter didn't know who her "Awnt So-and-So" was. I explained that it was just because she had never heard the word "awnt" in her life.

Another funny. MIL was setting the table w/my daughter at a "Baaa-buh-que" one day, when she said to her "He-ah, huney, I'll do the knives, and you do the fox." This brought my daughter to a complete standstill till I translated, "Forks, sweetheart, she means FORKS." Hahahahaha!

Or how about this one: we were helping MIL prepare for an impromptu trip to FL one X-mas (yes, this woman is just that organized) when she was running around the house panicked because she couldn't find her "khakis." "Oh whey-ah aah my khakis??" Took us quite awhile to figure out that she was looking for the CAR KEYS. Hahahahaha!

I'm happy to say that we are now contentedly living in the South, which, for all its flaws, at least has the advantage of being 800 miles away from my MIL!!!