shake and bake
n.— «They go through what is called shake n’ bake training and it’s something the public has never seen before…until now.…At first, the men are timed. They get all their gear on in about 30 seconds. But the rules keep changing. When they scatter the gear, it takes longer. And then it gets really interesting. The two lieutenants running the exercise make the guys turn their face masks around so they can’t see. They also make it so loud in the room, they can’t hear each other. Then they spread out the gear. This time the men are forced to find another way to communicate with their brother firefighters. It’s all about teamwork.» —“Firefighter Training: More than sirens and flashing lights” by Michelle Ponto WREG-TV (Memphis, Tennessee) Feb. 2, 2007. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
Ophelia in Johnson City, Tennessee, wonders about the exclamation her great-grandmother often used when something surprised her: Cat bristle! That may be her own version of a minced oath, although it fits with the idea of how a cat’s tail might look...
Homer in Kingsport, Tennessee, says that when Homer came in after curfew, his dad would say, “You guys have been out swarping, haven’t you?” Swarping is related to a variety of dialect terms in Scotland and Northern England that...