I can help who's next

[Benjamin Zimmer]

On Mon, Nov 30, 2009 at 3:25 PM, Steve Kl. <stevekl at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On Mon, Nov 30, 2009 at 3:19 PM, Greg Pulliam <pulliam at iit.edu> wrote:
>
>> I heard this repeatedly from the teenaged counter staff at Panera's
>> in eastern Springfield, IL yesterday. "Who's" presumably replaces the
>> longer "whoever's."
>
> I hear this all the time, and have heard this for quite some time,
> especially in coffee shops.

Discussed by Geoff Pullum on Language Log in 2005:

http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/002690.html

(In a postscript, he says, "Lots of people have now written to me to
confirm hearing or using the expression in coffee shops, bookstores,
or whatever, up to about fifteen years ago, especially in the upper
Midwest, which could be the cradle of the phrase.")

--Ben Zimmer

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