I never heard the phrase "wait on line" until I moved to New York. When I'm at Startbucks, Barnes and Noble, etc., they always say, "Next on line!"
I say "in line," but the standard seems to be "on line" here. How do you say it?
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I've never heard on line.
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In! I've never heard on line.
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In!
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In!
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Wait IN line. Next IN line.
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In - never heard anyone say it differently
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I guess it's a New York thing. It drives me crazy!
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IN line! I cringe when I hear "on line" on the national news.
I bet the responses will be different in the morning though. I'm guessing these posters are PST.
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I grew up in New York and always say "on line" (I also say "on Long Island" not "in Long Island", which seems to be a New York thing too!)
But my husband, from south Jersey, always says "in line". And we've lived in a few different areas of the country now...and its always "in line" from everyone else!
I never realized "on line" was odd until I left Long Island!
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I've never heard anything but "in line"
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Definitely IN line. Why would you be on line unless you're on the World Wide Web or literally standing ON a line?
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Yeah, I always thought that was weird! It's definitely IN line!
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OMG, it drove me crazy in NYC too!
It's definitely IN line!!
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Your topic made me think of buying stuff online vs. waiting (at the stores) in line. Ha! I say IN line
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Only ever heard of in line!
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It's definitely IN line. We don't really say line here either, though, in that context. We say "In the queue".
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In. I'm from wny so it must really be a NYC local thing.
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In!
It drove me bonkers when I lived in NYC!
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In! !
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In! Never heard on line - that would drive me nuts.
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In line until i moved to nyc. Now it's on line.
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I'm from New York..."on line" all the way!
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In, always in. Wait on line reminds me of dial up and AOL for some reason!
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In!
@Cherrybee: When I was in London last year someone tried to go to the front of the queue at Tesco and the clerk was furious and demanded that he leave the store. I love how serious British people are about their queues!
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In line! I've never heard anyone say on line....
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I grew up in NYC and say both, but mostly "on line".
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I feel like I use both... But I know the correct one is IN.
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In! I lived in Long Island for awhile and it was "on line" there too.
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In! On sounds so weird to me. What line are we standing on?
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I'm assuming at one point, lines actually had a physical line that people waited "on". When I went to private school, classes lined up on an actual line to wait for the teacher to collect them to go to class. So we waited "on line".
I probably use both terminology and not realize it since both sound right to me!
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IN
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Not a New Yorker, but the byproduct of a Queens/Brooklyn mating and I say on line.
Never thought about that before.This reminded me if that google movie. "On the line".
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@snowjewelz: Glad you have come to your senses LOL
I had never heard "on line" until I got to college. Lots of NYers there, trying to spread their corrupted language.
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In!
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@mamimami: Hahaha
I'll probably still continue to say both. New Yorker here!
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Never heard on-line referring to anything other than being on the internet haha. Always in line
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DH lived in NY as a kid and was born in NJ. He slips up and says on line but I have explained to him that that makes little sense unless you are at a theme park and are standing on a literal line on the ground or something. On line is the internet!
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Ugh! My DH and I argue about this regularly! He's from New York and I'm all California. He says on line. It drives me crazy!!
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Queue!
I'll probably still continue to say both. New Yorker here!
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39 comments