Bus driver: Ma’am, you’re going to have to move your bags. It’s just common courtesy.
Old lady: Well, what about the wheelchairs who don’t pay?
–M96 bus
Overheard by: Tommy
Bus driver: Ma’am, you’re going to have to move your bags. It’s just common courtesy.
Old lady: Well, what about the wheelchairs who don’t pay?
–M96 bus
Overheard by: Tommy
Angry teen on cell: I'm not gonna pay 18 dollars for a wedgie!
–Lingerie Department, Macy's
Overheard by: me neither
Girl on cell: I don't have a problem with camping, but why do they have to give me a sleeping bag? Can't they give me linens? It's not like I'm not giving them an insignificant amount of money.
–W Broadway & Grand
Suit on cell: At first I was only making $30,000 a year, but last year I got shot in the foot, and then I got a $1,000 bonus, so now I'm making $32,000 a year. Shit!
–F Train
Overheard by: Brittany Smith
Loud woman on cell: I like and don't mind fucking you, but I need to get paid. I'm unemployed right now.
–108th & Broadway
Elevator operator for observatory, upon leaving: Please come again! We want your money.
–Empire State Building
Old guy in dark suit to young guy in dark suit: You're not embezzling money!
–48th & 8th
Girl: Excuse me, which of these trains goes to Manhattan?
Suit: Shut up.
–34th Street N/Q/R/W station
Southern woman: Oh! Are you a performer?
Chick: Yes, I’m studying acting and musical theater.
Southern woman: Wow! That’s so amazing! Maybe we’ll see you on Broadway one of these days! Good luck!
Chick: Thanks!
She leaves the train.
Southern woman: Yeah, right. Ha, ha, ha!
–1 train
Old man: Is that a theater?
Old woman: No, it’s a McDonalds.
–42nd between 7th & 8th
Overheard by: Adam Grosswirth
Overweight geeky lunatic protester: The perpetual battery will last longer than any of us! The perpetual battery is the answer to all of our energy problems! It will draw its power from the very vacuum of space!
–Union Square South
Overheard by: Percival
Crazy old guy with beard and hat with lots of buttons: Where is the moon? Where is the moon, where is the galaxy? Have you ever seen Men in Black? It's all about the galaxy. The earth is beneath Columbus Circle. The moon is at 64th and Central Park West. If you had to suspend reality, how would you do it?
–Uptown 2 Train
Overheard by: Jingles
Professor: Has anybody ever seen a solar eclipse? Anybody, anybody? (silence) No? Well, maybe we were all inside on Facebook when it happened…
–St. John's University, Staten Island
Overheard by: Andrea
Visiting professor, explaining "word salad": Cream cheese to the moon mother, fuckers!
–Columbia University
Overheard by: Molly Moo
Obviously sober guy: I know Vikings eat ham, but what about Saturn?
–Rotating Cube Sculpture, Astor Place
Blonde: You cannot eat in space! It sucks you in.
–Union Square
Crazy bag man with hat full of buttons: Where's the moon, where's the moon? If the globe on Columbus Cirlce is the earth, the moon is on 63rd Street West. That is a test of spatial ree-al-uh-tee. How well did you do?
–Uptown 3 Train, Brooklyn
Overheard by: Les Izzmore
Older woman to friend: Down there where the servants are, you know, where the gardening people and the kitchen is, I don't go there. I just don't go there.
–38th & 5th
Overheard by: garden in manhattan?
Greek Princess shopping for wedding rings: This isn't the more expensive ring I wanted but we just bought an apartment in the 70s.
–Tiffany's Second Floor
Overprivileged teenage girl on cell: The bourgeoisie… The bourgeoisie are like, the common people.
–Union Square
College girl: No, I mean seriously: who, by the age of 25, has not been to Rome or Florence?
–Fordham University, Lincoln Center
Overheard by: Dan
Six-year-old: Mommy, how do you spell "Forbes"?
–Restaurant, Upper East Side
Overheard by: jess
Old Coot: String beans.
Employee: How about green beans?
Old Coot: No, string beans!
Employee: I don’t see them!
Old Coot: You’ll find it.
Employee: You have to get string beans, you can’t get regular beans?
–Waldbaum’s, Bensonhurst
Older woman: It seems like you’re really happy!
Younger man: Yes, I am. And it seems like Jonah is really happy, too.
Older woman: We think that happiness is over-rated. We are not happy. We are possessed.
— Gallery opening on Rivington St.
A young man apparently cuts the line at the PO.
Old Italian: Hey, there’s a line here buddy.
Young guy: I waited already, I got money orders.
Old Italian: I didn’t see you anywhere near the line.
Young guy: I got money orders before and now I’m mailing them.
Old Italian: We’ve all got orders. Geez, no one wants to wait on line any more. And now the guy’s serving him.
Young guy: Shut up.
Old Italian: Ah, get lost, you idiot. If I was five years younger I would put you up against the wall.
Postal Worker: Next.
Old Italian: How much to send this express mail?
Postal Worker: $13.65.
Old Italian: Maron.
–Bensonhurst
Old Lady: Those kids in Columbine used to bully kids themselves. I saw an interview with one. You think the parents didn’t know something was going on, the way they used to dress up like Hitler?
Black Nurse: Really?
Old Lady: One of them was half-Jewish, too!
Black Nurse: That don’t make sense.
Old Lady: They think they’re hot stuff. They don’t care.
–W Train
Old lady (looking directly at Hispanic woman and her baby): They don’t speak English and they don’t wanna learn. They just want pay from America. They hate our guts.
[to baby]: Give your Mommy a kiss!
–B6 Bus, Brooklyn