Music

Girl to class: I love classical music! I listen to the Bambi soundtrack all the time!

–Curtis High School, Staten Island

Guy in lobby, at intermission: Hands down, the best band I've ever seen in concert… Hootie and the Blowfish.

–Jazz at Lincoln Center

Guy on cell: I guess they're musicians. They put bitches ahead of practice.

–79th St b/w York & 1st

Overheard by: Queixa

Gay man to another, walking out of a bank: I mean, if you listen to like, one Sade song every six years, it's okay.

–15th St & 8th Ave

Lesbian: Fuck her! All she wants to do is stay home and sit in the kitchen and drink beer and listen to Melissa Etheridge! Fuck her! She can take a cab home!

–Staten Island

Overheard by: Kateri

Straight girl with a seat at the piano: No, I've never been here before, but I'm actually having a good time. I mean, I don't know most of these songs, but earlier he was playing The Sound of Music, and I was rocking out to that.

–Marie's Crisis Piano Bar

Overheard by: Duncan Pflaster

Crazy old cat lady to guy who just shut off obnoxiously loud music in next lane: Why'd you shut it off? I liked that song!

–Marathon Parkway & Northern Boulevard

Soccer mom: In two weeks, my knitting circle’s going to the strip club.

–28th & Lex

Girl: I want to become a stripper so that I can see Patti LuPone in Gypsy every night.

–St. James Theatre

Overheard by: Erin

Loud NYU chick: Listen to the opening guitar riff of Voodoo child. It makes you want to be a stripper!

–Bobst Library

Overheard by: evil em

Six-year-old boy to parents: Oohh! Zombie strippers! Let’s see that!

–Port Authority

10-year-old white boy: Mom, you know what I'm wondering?
Mom: No, what?
10-year-old: What does “shish kanish” mean?
Mom, staring at him: What the hell are you talking about?
10-year-old: In that song by Shakira it says she makes a man wanna “shish kanish.”
Mom, shaking head: “Speak Spanish,” Cory. She made a man wanna speak Spanish. Shit, you ain't never gonna be a singer.

–Tenement Museum

Overheard by: Excuse me while I kiss this guy

Hobo: You like rap? I started that shit. I did. I started that rap shit. Way before hip-hop. You don’t like rap, you ain’t shit.

–4 train

Overheard by: Aaron

Male clerk, singing: … And one of these days these foots are gonna walk all over you.
Ghetto female clerk: Foots? It’s feets.

–19th & Broadway

Old woman, putting stamps on envelope: I wish they would change the picture on these…
Middle aged woman: Frank Sinatra?
Old woman: Oh god, not that creep!

–Post Office, Stuyvesant

Overheard by: flat rate box

Soulful black man: Well, think about this. A white man lived in Graceland, a black man lived in Neverland. (nods knowingly)

–Downtown A Train

Overheard by: Bearsian

Gallery director to intern: So after he was arrested we sent a letter to Henry Gates asking him for money, you know, since we are a multicultural organization.

–Lower East Side Art Gallery

Latina to Latino: Latinos and black people can't be racist. That's, like, just white people.

–Red Hook, Brooklyn

White hobo: When I see a black nigger together with a white nigger, that just confuses the hell outta me.

–Houston & Clinton

Woman: She likes black dogs because she's black, and I like white dogs because I'm white.

–Upper West Side

Overheard by: Yehuda

Female Hipster, singing: Boom boom boom, let’s go back to my room…
Male Hipster: I remember when that song came out–that was the dirtiest song imaginable!

— Lolita

Columbia grad student: …developing a really spectacular
sense of intellectual arrogance.

–Columbia University

Professor, receiving text message in class: Ooh. That’s interesting. Invitation to go dancing, not from my girlfriend. Thank God I’ve got permission… We’re never going to get to anything today, are we? I’m so bad at this…

–Tisch School of the Arts, NYU

Overheard by: Matthew K Johnson

Chinese professor: You see Chinese like tofu, you never use it.

–John Jay College

Overheard by: soccerking3t

Teen guy: So I ended up in a dress. I don’t think English class will ever be the same.

–Stuyvesant High School

Overheard by: Natasha

Sadistic professor: Unfortunately we don’t flog people anymore. You usually pass out after you finish screaming.

–Fordham, the Bronx

Overheard by: Jess McGins

Drunken pre-med to drunken boy teetering on a concrete railing: Reed, if you fall, I’m not a doctor yet!

–West Village, 8th & 14th

Overheard by: annie

NYU girl to professor: So, if you’re sleeping with Nietzsche, you shouldn’t ask the question, "What are you thinking?"

–NYU classroom, Mercer & Houston

Weird girl: Did you bring the scepter?
Weird boy: No, I forgot.
Weird girl: That’s the second time!
Weird boy: I know, I’m sorry! I got the Tetris theme song stuck in my head again!

–D train

Overheard by: Kaela