Inland Northern American English, aka Great Lakes dialect - C/D?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inland_Northern_American_English

I'm fascinated by this accent because when I hear it spoken in the wild I can't tell if the speaker is from Buffalo, NY or Minneapolis, MN, which is of course a huge geographical range. I was also surprised to read the part in the Wikipedia entry that says that most of the vowel shifting that defines the accent happened in the 1960s. That seems so recent!

I'm assuming some of you out there speak this dialect, or accent, whatever you call it. Do you have any thoughts about it?

1. Not anymore.
2. It's horrible. Harrible.

Just to reiterate, when I hear Lydia Lunch speak, and then Susan Saint James speak, that's the same accent to me. Even though Lydia is from Rochester, NY and Susan is from outside Chicago. That's kind of a mindblower. But then, I've known people from Chicago who don't talk like that, so I know it's kind of an optional thing. I just want to know more.

I say 'eh' sometimes without thinking

Does "eh" spill over into the US, I thought it was exclusively Canadian

Party store, in Michigan, for convenience store

Ha, what?

1. There is a Chicago accent, specifically, and I used to be able to hear it but I don't think I can anymore. But it exists, separately or maybe in addition to the rest of the Great Lakes affect.

2. I looked up footage of both Lydia Lynch & SSJ speaking and I can't hear what you're hearing probably because they both sound "normal" to me! lol. SSJ I can hear a bit more flattening in her Os, like in "boss," "down," "gotta."

3. Both of them enunciate too well, they literally speak TOO clearly--or else modern speech has trended away from enunciation (as it also has with melody). The clearest example that comes to my mind of what this accent is today is Giuliani's drunk witness Melissa Carone? I won't link her here but you can find lots of recent video.

the stereotypical chicago accent is more staccato sounding to me than the rochester/WNY accent

bag = beeeeeee-yeg, love this

I worked with a woman from Lansing MI that had a strong version of this