Buttermilk and Twinkees

[pengolodh_sc at yahoo.no]

No, I'm not referring to mixing the two!

What excactly is buttermilk?  Is it a close relation of sourmilk?  
The only thing I ever heard of buttermilk was in radio on a Sunday in 
Kentucky - some bloke talking about "buttermilk pop", apparently one 
of his most traumatizing childhood-memories.

Some more on Twinkees:  On a message-board about battleships that I 
frequently visit, the term Twinkee has been assigned to the events 
when a battleship suddenly blows up from a single lucky hit in a spot 
where the designers had enver thought it possible for the ship to be 
hit.  Occurences include HMS Invincible, HMS Queen Mary and HMS 
Princess Royal at the Battle of Jutland in WW1 and HMS Hood at the 
battle of the Denmark Straits in WW2.  The reason for this bizarre 
piece of nomenclature seems to have something to do with Twinkees 
having so many preservatives added that they appear to be 
indestructible... (like most Yank foods - I've heard rumours of a 
bread that was left on its own in a box for two months during 
Washington DC's hottest summer ever - it was still edible when the 
owner returned)

Gastronomically
Christian Stubø (who wonders if he should start talking about 
Norwegian culinary specialties)