Dude #1: It’s not that I have a moral objection to the death penalty. I just don’t think it should be the government making the decision.
Dude #2: Would you prefer an angry mob?
–122nd & Amsterdam
Dude #1: It’s not that I have a moral objection to the death penalty. I just don’t think it should be the government making the decision.
Dude #2: Would you prefer an angry mob?
–122nd & Amsterdam
Man: I need a cigarette.
Woman: You don’t need them. You’re gonna smoke one, get addicted, and one day you’re gonna wake up and you’re gonna be dead.
–Scotty’s Diner, Lex between 39th and 40th
Overheard by: P. Groban
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
Girl: Man, I feel like shit.
Guy: Why?
Girl: What if he was seriously hurt?
Guy: Huh?
Girl: I’ve been thinking about breaking up with him, and what if he had died?
Guy: It’d save you the trouble?
–PS 321, Park Slope
Teenage girl: I want to be cremated into a diamond. Or…oh! A pearl!
Boyfriend: What, you want your family to put your ashes in a clam shell and hope for the best? Good luck with that!
–F Train
Overheard by: Should Ride the F More Often
Older woman #1: This is my shih tzu. I got her when my yorkie died.
Older woman #2: I got my yorkie when my sister died.
Older woman #1: I don't know what I'd do if my shih tzu died.
–Union Square
Girl on cell: So I bought this air conditioner for my living room, and it's entirely too large for me to install by myself, because it weighs 78 lbs. No, seriously, I cannot even get it out of the box. I know–for the time being I'm just referring to it as a Duchamp "readymade." Ew! Don't you call me bohemian!
–19th & 6th
Art professor: You should look at Picasso and Matisse. These people will be more important to you than your family. Cousin Philly. I had a cousin Philly, and I loved him very much. But he's dead now.
–Pratt Institute
Overheard by: traPt
Lawyer to friend, about Vincent van Gogh: You know, I could have gotten him disability.
–Van Gogh Exhibit, MoMA
Woman, discussing gallery: It was all modern stuff–but not, like, the kind of modern art that children can do.
–20th & 5th
Tourist boy: You can see his penis! It's not art if you can see his penis!
–Petrie Court, Metropolitan Museum of Art
Waspy girl to gaggle of friends: You know, medium-rare is, like, totally the new medium. You know what I mean? (friends stare blankly) No, I guess you wouldn't.
–6 Train
Overheard by: I Like Mine Bleeding
B&T CSR: Pork killed my father.
–80 Pine St
Overheard by: It's me
Stroller-pushing mom to friend: I gotta do something about her leg! It looks like freeze-dried meat.
–DeKalb & Washington, Brooklyn
Overheard by: Morning Glory
NYU girl to friend: My hair smells like meat.
–NYU Kimmel Center
Overheard by: evanescent
Girl to friend: This is my pi system: it's like a sausage.
–NYU Classroom
Man to can of corned beef: God, you understand me so well.
–Duane Reade
Overheard by: Murphy
Guy: That’s a really old graveyard. They have tombstones going back to the 1600s.
Girl: I dont understand. How is that possible?
Guy: It’s an old church. People were buried there a long time ago.
Girl: Yeah, but wasn’t our country made around the 1770s?
Guy: Yes, but there were colonists here from France, England and Spain before that.
Girl: So they brought their dead relatives over here to bury them?
–Trinity Church
Overheard by: Jonathan Bloom
Girl #1: Michael Jackson is dead? Really?
Girl #2: Yeah, we read it on TMZ. They're usually pretty good about knowing when people are dead.
–The Mill
