Daughter: What’s on your leg?
Mother: It’s cellulite, all women have it. And if you think the women you see in magazines don’t, they do. They just get it covered up in their pictures by a special pen called an airbrush.
Daughter: Will I get cellulite?
Mother: Yes, soon.
–Century 21, Cortlandt Street
Old lady #1: Here she comes now.
Old lady #2: I’ll be dead by the time she gets here.
Old lady #3: She’s not moving too fast.
Their friend arrives.
Old lady #1: Aren’t you dead yet?
–5th Ave. & 9th St.
Two brothers, ages 8 and 10, sit on the 6 train. Across from them sit their mother and their aunt. The older boy stands, letting his brother continue to sit, next to a pole. A largish older lady wedges herself in next to the young boy, pushing him into the pole.
Mother: Lady, you can’t sit there, you’re crushing him!
Lady: I’m old enough to sit, he’s young enough to stand.
Mother: You’re crushing him!
Lady: He has plenty of room.
Younger brother: Get the hell off!
Lady: I’m old enough to be your grandmother.
Younger brother: You’re not my grandmother.
Mother: Thank God.
Aunt: Thank God.
Younger brother: Get off me, you big fat lady!
Mother: Stop that, be quiet. Get over here.
He moves to her lap.
Younger brother: You’re not my grandmother.
Older brother: Would everybody shut up? Don’t fight on the train!
Lady’s husband: Stop it. Stop talking to them.
Lady: I’m telling you to close your mouth.
Older brother: Everybody stop!
Mother: We’re getting off here.
Aunt: Thank God.
Lady: Thank God.
The family hustles out of the train. The rest of the passengers laugh as quietly as possible.
–6 train
Guy on cell: You’ve got the best job: being a mom.
–42nd between 6th & Madison
Woman: …maybe because I got my period in the 4th grade and looked like everybody’s mother by the 6th grade. I was huge.
–27th street office
Mom: Now, this is not the Louvre, so don’t be jaded or anything.
–Brooklyn Museum
Overheard by: Cat Pop
Drunk: If a woman hadda right to choose where I come from, I wouldn’t be here today!
–Odessa Cafe, Avenue A
Overheard by: Ted Lattis
Chick: I saw my mother on stage in underwear and a bra with motorized tassels…
–13th & 5th
Overheard by: Caroline Norris
Teen #1: Damn, kid! Your face mad hairy!
Teen #2: I’m a grown-ass man, dog.
–A train
Woman #1: I told my family that if I get old and can’t take care of myself to hire me a…
Woman #2: A male nurse.
Woman #1: … a young, good-looking boy.
Woman #2: A male nurse.
Woman #1: Specifically for the purpose of giving me a sponge bath.
Woman #2: I have a funny story about that.
–Park Plaza Diner, Brooklyn Heights
Overheard by: TG
Woman: Excuse me. I have to put something in my dryer.
Girl folding clothes: Oh, okay.
Woman: Excuse me! I have to put something else in my dryer.
Girl: O-kay…
Woman: Now I have to take something out of my dryer…unbelievable.
Girl: Wow, you’re a case!
Woman: I’m a what?!
Girl: A case. I’ve never seen anybody so worked up over laundry.
Woman: Well, you haven’t lived very long, have you?
Girl: Not as long as you!…Have a nice day!
Woman: Fuck you!
–York Launderette, York Avenue and E. 82nd
Chick: One time I saw this old guy fall and drop his cane onto the subway tracks, and it was raining, so we tried to talk people into giving him their umbrella, since he couldn’t get the cane–and we were so mad when no one would give us an umbrella, ’cause you can’t just buy a cane at Duane Reade.
–6 train
Overheard by: Todd Seavey
Guard: Safety first! That’s a Harold Lloyd film. Safety First. 1928. You ever watch any of those old Harold Lloyd films?
–51st between 6th and 7th
Overheard by: Crunkyteen
20-something female shopkeeper to coworker, as Michael Jackson's "Rock with You" plays on the radio: Did you hear he's sick? Apparently, he's in the hospital. I know, it's crazy. Can you imagine if he dies? If he dies, that'll be, like, the most awful thing to happen to America in years!
–Pet Food Store
Overheard by: Nathalie
Suit on cell: What if Michael Jackson sucking your dick was the cure for cancer?
–8th & Broadway
Man, lighting cigarette: So what'd he die from? A sunburn?
–Chambers St. & West Broadway
Middle aged black lady on cell: If you can get Michael Jackson on a condom box it would definitely sell.
–MacDougal & 8th St
Nine-year-old boy, pointing to a newspaper article, to younger sister: Oh yeah, that guy? He was fifty. He used to be a black guy but made himself become white.
–Canal & Orchard, Chinatown
Overheard by: Lauren T.
Large tattooed man, discussing Michael Jackson: One of those kids is his; the other two can't be, they're white. They were all unofficially inseminated, though.
–Delancey & Essex
