[HPFGU-OTChatter] Re: the ongoing English usage

[Sheryll Townsend]

> 
> Carol responds:
> 
> If the next person in line can't be readily determined,
> the expression
> should be "May I help whoever is next?"
> ("whoever," meaning "whatever
> person," is used when the identity is not readily
> determinable) or
> "May I help the next person?" "May I help
> you?" is used when the
> identity of the next person in line is obvious.
> 
> "May I help who's next" appears to be a
> jarring blend of "May I help
> you?" and "Who's next?" either of which
> is grammatical by itself, but
> the second sounds a bit brusque and the first implies that
> the bank
> teller or whoever can readily determine the identity of the
> next person. 
> 
> At any rate, I first started hearing "May I help
> who's next?"  about
> ten years ago" and now I hear it almost every time I
> stand in a line
> ("queue" to our British friends), whether I'm
> buying a movie ticket or
> Kentucky Fried Chicken or even depositing a check (if, for
> some
> reason, I'm not using the ATM). I'm expecting to
> hear it when I check
> my luggage at the airport for a quick trip to San Diego on
> the tenth.
> Of course, if the airline clerks are harried, I may just
> hear a brisk
> "Next!" or "Next, please!" I almost
> hope they are because "May I help
> who's next?" grates on my ears and is spreading
> all too rapidly as it is.
> 

Sheryll:

As someone who has to call the next person in line up to her cash all time, what I say varies depending on how crowded the store is (how loudly I have to speak), and who the next person in line. 

Busy nights will have me alternately between "Can I help whoever's next?" and "I can help the next person in line".

Quiet days and regular customers make me much more relaxed. More often than not it'll be a single person waiting to check out their movies, in which case I generally just smile and ask, "What are you taking home today?". I've also been known to tell customers that if I don't like their choices I"ll make them put them back and pick new movies. That's reserved for customers I at least every week and whose tastes I know. 

You know, I was just reminded of my grandmother when typing this. We lived in Labrador for 3 years when I was very young and I picked up quite a bit of the Newfie accent and expressions while I was there. When we left there we spent some time with my mother's parents. My grandmother was born in England and was a stickler for, as my mother says, speaking the Queen's English. I was in the backyard one day and my grandmother came out to ask if I'd like a cookie. Apparently I responded with, "Stay where ya be, I'll come where yer at" with a thick Newfie accent, prompting my grandmother to moan that I'd been able to speak proper English when I'd left there. :D

Sheryll, who rarely steers customers wrong in selecting movies and tries to use proper English all the time but has been known to occasionally come out with a 'Laaard tunderin' Jaysus' when provoked ;)


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