As you may know, I am not from North Dakota. I have lived here for just over a year and anytime I go to a restaurant, the staff use a phrase here I have never heard before.

I noticed this the first time I sat down in a restaurant in North Dakota. As I made the cross country drive from New York to North Dakota I stopped in Fargo at Granite City. I had lived in Iowa for two years which also had a Granite City so I stopped at some place familiar.

But when the waitress brought me my food, she asked, "Is there anything else I can get you right away?"

It seems like a basic question that anyone would ask but having lived in New York, Pennsylvania and Iowa and also traveling to various different states and eating, I have never heard anyone ask if I needed anything else "right away."

Typically, elsewhere people ask the same question but leave off the "right away" or they ask something like "Does everything look OK?"

Additionally, fast food employees also say something here that I have never heard anywhere else. Anytime I pull up to a drive thru, the people say, "order when you're ready."

Everywhere else I have been they typically just say "welcome to [restaurant], can I take your order?"

Do you notice this when you go to restaurants out of state?