Long 'Ere We Came to the Streets of Aberdeen

In the comments to one of Tex's posts, I mentioned having dinner last night with an older gentleman who had been in Iraq as a British soldier just about fifty years before I was there. He is of English origin, but at one point he had spent significant time teaching in Aberdeen. The Scots of Aberdeen, he said, feel about the same way about their English visitors as Southerners do about Yankees.

He told a story to illustrate the point. An Englishman is driving north from Edinburgh toward Aberdeen, when he comes to a fork in the road. The signpost pointing to the left fork reads "Aberdeen, 30 miles," and the sign on the right fork reads the same thing. Puzzled, he pulls off to ponder the situation until he sees an old Scot working his field.


Grim faces a similar dilemma.

The Englishman gets out of the car and steps over to where the Scot is laboring, and calls down to him from the road. "Excuse me, good man," he says, "but does it make any difference which road I take to Aberdeen?"

The Scot ponders the question in a dark silence for a moment. Then he replies, "Nae ta me!"
on

7 comments:

  1. Texan9911:38 AM

    Which reminds me for some reason of my husband's usual response to the question sometimes asked at a party, "What do you do?"

    "In the event of what?" he replies.

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  2. Gringo11:33 PM

    Which reminds me of the Bert and I tale about the tourist who asks the Mainer, Which way to Millinocket? After due consideration, the Mainer tells the stranger, "You can't get there from here."

    I could tell it to you in the Down East accent used in the story, but instead you'll have to settle for the real thing.

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  3. Grim12:08 AM

    An allegedly true story from the Forsyth County of my youth: a stranger passed through, and asked after the Church of Christ.

    The interlocutor said, "Well, if you go that way, you'll come to First Baptist, and that's Mr. Martin's church. And if you go that way, you'll come to Second Baptist, and that's Mr. Stewart's church. And if you go that way, you'll come to the Church of God, and that's Mr. Tallant's church. Partner, I don't think Christ's got a church in this town."

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  4. Grim12:39 AM

    I alter the names, very slightly, to protect the guilty. :)

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  5. Anonymous1:50 PM

    I've got to remember that reply, Texan99.

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  6. Nicholas Darkwater7:47 AM

    @Gringo: That line comes from the great Fred Allen radio show. One of the characters, Titus Moody, was a New England farmer who used that line in a number of skits.

    If you take the time to research the show, it will be time well spent. It was a classic.

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  7. Assistant Village Idiot9:08 PM

    Nicholas - thanks. I'm a 10th-generation Newhampshireman who is quite interested.

    And I've got more of the same.

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