Translation Tuesday: Fixin’ To

My new graduate staff members started to work this week, and right away I got to act as a translator. One GA was born in Japan and moved to California at age 4 and then to New Jersey as a teenager. Another one is from Illinois and another from Seattle, but then moved to the DC area as a teen. Today another GA, who is from the South and has a DEEP southern accent, said some things that they just couldn’t understand.

So, today’s phrase of the day: fixn’ to. As in: I’m fixn’ to make a run to the store, or I’m fixn’ to take a shower. It is the shower one that is my first recollection of hearing the phrase. One of my roommates in college said it and I must have asked her to repeat herself three times so that I could hear her correctly. I am not sure if the correct spelling is fixn’ or fixin,’ if anyone knows, please enlighten me. But in short, it means… getting ready to go do, or planning on taking some sort of action.

So yes, a common phrase that is used daily in the South and today I got to educate three very intelligent graduate students on what it meant, so they wouldn’t be totally lost when they heard a native say it! How can you use it in your own vernacular today- if you are not from down here?