Those of us who reside here accept that the South is a peculiar place. After all, we live on southern soil, and breathe southern air, and grow up steeped in all parts (good and bad) of southern culture (skids or otherwise!)

It must be said, however, that we do like to come up with odd nicknames for our husbands, our wives, our partners, our children, our pets.

For instance: Madeline Anne is frequently called MaddyGail, hairball, fishbreath, Maddylena, Maddycakes, etc. Zoe is Harriett Houdini, or tater, or cutie pie or just plain momma's baby :-)

Back to people, where else in the world is referring to someone as “butterball” an endearment?

And we do have a WIDE variety of food related nicknames: muffin, sugar (and it’s kissing cousin, sugar-pie), dumpling, pumpkin, butternut squash, peapod, peanut, honey, apple of my eye, etc. followed by your classics: sweetheart, baby, sweetie, darling, babygirl, etc. You also one remaining category of slang that influences our nickname vocabulary, with one honorable mention: boo.

My personal favorite? Grandmother’s “sugarfoot” . That’s the ultimate expression of grandmotherly love…being called sugarfoot.

I guess that’s just a southern thing.