Researchers Discover Final Living User of “Mind Your P’s and Q’s”
WASHINGTON, D.C. – A team of linguists from Georgetown University announced today that they have located the final living user of the phrase “mind your P’s and Q’s.” Their discovery ended a decades-long search that many experts had quietly abandoned in favor of writing grant applications containing the word “algorithm.”
The individual, Harold Pritchard, 84, retired municipal codes inspector, and owner of a sweater that has outlived three refrigerators, was discovered using the expression during a dispute over the correct placement of cucumber sandwiches at a church luncheon.
“It was unmistakable,” said Elaine Ross, 47, historical linguist, whose hobby is cataloging abandoned shopping lists recovered from library books.
“We believed the phrase had become extinct sometime around the last recorded uses of the words ‘hullabaloo’ and ‘bees knees.’ Then Mr. Pritchard appeared.”
Federal authorities immediately put Pritchard into protective custody at an undisclosed location. His speech is monitored around the clock in hopes of determining what the phrase ever meant. Thus far investigators have not reached a consensus.
One theory suggests that “mind your P’s and Q’s” originated in printing. Another points to taverns. A third, recently advanced by Professor Leonard Grubb, 61, semi-retired etymologist, and winner of a county fair ribbon for artisanal zucchini, argues that nobody ever knew and that people had simply been pretending.
Meanwhile Pritchard remains cooperative. When asked where he learned the phrase, he stared through a window for a few seconds before replying, “People used to say it.”
When asked whether he understood the significance of being the final known user of the phrase mind your P’s and Q’s, Pritchard replied, “Great Scott, keep your shirt on. That is neither fish nor fowl. I am as happy as a clam and full of beans. This beats all.”
Linguists described the exchange as “deeply encouraging” and requested emergency funding.
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