Eight-year old boy, barely audibly: Do you have any kid's shoes?
Middle aged clerk: Do I have sex? (pause) Well…
Eight-year old boy, slightly more audibly: Naw, do you have any kid's shoes?
Middle aged clerk: Kids? Yes. I've got one 24 and one 19. I know they're not really kids, but they still seem like it to me.
Eight-year-old boy: Naw, naw! (loudly) I said “do you have any kid's shoes?”
–Shoe Store, Brooklyn
Overheard by: Eremi
Older woman: Excuse me, have you found a set of keys in here?
Teller: No, ma'am.
Older woman: They're not mine, they're a friend's.
Teller: We haven't found any.
Older woman: If I lost my keys, I would be upset, and would want the the person who found them to give them back.
Teller: We haven't found your keys.
Older woman: If they were my keys I would be very upset right now.
–Bank, Astoria
Overheard by: Natalie
Friendly young clerk: It’s terrible news about Vonnegut, isn’t it?
Old woman: I think he deserved to be fired! He shouldn’t be saying that racist stuff on the radio!
–Thrift Shop, 23rd & 3rd
Box office employee: Would you like to add a ticket for the 3D movie?
20-something girl: Is it for the movie and the exhibit in 3D?
Box office employee: No, just the movie is in 3D.
–King Tut Exhibit
Girl looking at garbage and dirt spilled on the sidewalk: Gross. You think it’s supposed to be art?
–Broadway & Houston
Literature professor: So anything that anybody ever painted was a Guido?
–NYU Silver Center
Plausibly mad septuagenarian clerk: When I was 16 Stravinsky bought my first painting. It was written up in the paper. A couple of days later, I was kidnapped.
–Barnes & Noble, Lincoln Center
Overheard by: Seth
Father to four-year-old son: Looking at art makes your legs tired.
–Metropolitan Museum Lobby
Philistine: I don’t like art in which you have to understand the motivation behind it.
–Outside the Guggenheim
Overheard by: Devoted Puppy
Professor-type man to group of teens looking at Greek sculptures: And if the sculpture’s back is up against the wall and you want to see it from behind, just get up against a wall and look at its ass as much as you can… yeah! It’s not dirty or wrong… Just look at its ass!
–Metropolitan Museum of Art
Saleswoman: Hi, can I help you?
Rich woman: (ignores her)
Saleswoman: Hello…? Hi. How are you? Can I help?
Rich woman: What do you want?
Saleswoman: Um…I was just saying hello?
Rich woman: Oh! You were being friendly! How cute! Hello to you, too.
–3rd & Madison Ave
Shopper: Will you have spring shoes out next week?
Saleslady: What?
Shopper: Spring shoes! Next week?
Saleslady: Spring?
Shopper: Yeah, downstairs they told me you always have the next season’s shoes out one season ahead.
Saleslady: Spring?
Shopper: Yes! Spring! Next week!
–Macy’s
Overheard by: Roxy Chanel McPink
Girl on phone: Did he actually try to kill you, or is this like the time at the supermarket when you thought the cashier was coming onto you because he touched your hand giving you change?
–Time Square
HR person: I don't want to whack her until I have to. But I probably will.
–Broadway
Little boy to mom: Mommy, what does it feel like to die?
–7th & Carroll, Park Slope
Well-dressed man on cell: I know, we need to make sure that none of them live.
–8th St & Broadway
Seven-year-old girl to mom, after being scolded: I'm going to kill you.
–4 Train
Long Island woman: Well, sure, it's a great place if you want to be raped and murdered every day.
–LIRR
Overheard by: Cori
Bookstore girl to six-year-old in suit: Hey little boy, are you lost? Where is your nanny?
Six-year-old: I don't know, but I see my driver outside!
–Bookstore, Upper East Side
Overheard by: AlphaNYC
Deli clerk to mother with spoiled child: You should pull a Chris Benoit on her!
Mother: I thought about it.
–Silver Star Meat Market, Nostrand Ave
