My friend DeAnna was outside tending her lawn one afternoon when an elderly gentleman on a casual stroll stopped to chat. They bemoaned another day of torturous Cody winds, and he told her about a tornado he remembers while growing up in Kansas. At the end of his long story, she replied simply, “Well, I’ll be darn!”

For a brief moment, my 31-year-old friend said she felt older than he was. We all know that feeling of, “Why did I say that? Of all the things I could have said, that’s the best I could do?”

It’s like when someone graciously thanks me for something and I say, “You betcha!” More than once (but less than five) I’ve walked away berating myself: “You betcha? You betcha? What does that even mean, ya hillbilly?!”

“Don’t mention it” is another odd reply to a gesture of thanks. “Thank you so much for saving my life with the Heimlich maneuver and dislodging the meatball I was choking on.” “Ah, don’t mention it.” Well, she already did, of course. Again, nonsensical, but acceptable.

But getting back to “I’ll be darn,” I assured DeAnna her response wasn’t all that strange, particularly to an old codger living in the past. He most likely took no umbrage whatsoever. Weeks later though, while she related details to a roomful of people about her recent trip back to Wisconsin to visit her ailing grandmother, she dropped another conspicuous nugget. And I quote: “My mom and brother picked me up at the airport and I thought we’d go directly to the hospital, but pretty soon we’re driving all over tarnation.”

I’m thinking, “So where in the Sam Hill is this tarnation? It sounds like a filthy place; I reckon possibly some petroleum-rich nation in Africa.”

But by the same token, where in tarnation is Sam Hill?

I have no particular reason for exploring these mindless words and expressions – “DeAnnaisms” if you will – except to validate their existence, while at the same time pondering where in the tarnation they come from.

I’ll never forget after a softball game years ago when I told my teammates a story that seemed to surprise them. Good ol’ Lee Ballinger looks me right in the eye and says, “The hell, ya say?”

It wasn’t an oratorical gem by any means, but even though I’d never heard it before, I instinctively knew he meant, “Wow, are you serious? I find that hard to believe.” But let’s count the letters in those separate retorts, shall we? I think you’ll find as I did, that Lee’s, to-the-point reply involved only 12 letters. The grammatically correct version numbered 38, and the comma (plus Leap Year) gives it 39.

By golly, that’s a thrifty savings of 27 letters. And isn’t it kind of fun saying, “The hell, ya say?” You betcha it is.

Granted, you could shorten it even further with, “Ya don’t say?” but what you save in letters you lose in style, so it’s kind of a wash.

People who aren’t particularly gifted at these aberrational expressions can come off as just plain annoying; for instance, those who answer, “Yessirreebob!” Even if the fellow you’re answering is named Robert, that’s still a DeAnnaism that’s better left to cartoon characters such as Homer Simpson’s neighbor, Ned Flanders.

Also, the aforementioned “By golly” should be used sparingly, but certainly will always have a place in our Unofficial, Nonsensical, Deannaism Thesaurus. One of my favorite groups ever – one that truly revolutionized music – The Stylistics, sang the all-time classic, “Betcha by Golly Wow.” Like it? I loved it!

Now, you might ask, “Doug, were you possibly bereft of anything remotely profound to write about this week, thus slung together this pointless, parcel of drivel?” To that I would respond, “You’re darn tootin’!”