On Cell

NYU girl to friend: I mean, I hate him and it’s making my hair fall out but I think our relationship really works.

–Whole Foods, Union Square

Man to friend: She wanted to go to dinner on some kind of date shit. I wanna bring her to a bar and fuck her in the bathroom.

–G Train

Overheard by: Sarah

Fat chick to friends: I don’t know. He moved. We weren’t serious, you know? I mean how can you be serious with a man who wanted to move to an Indian reservation? (friends nod in approval) I mean why would you want to move to an Indian reservation anyway? It’s like the projects… but in camp.

–Casa Mono

Overheard by: foodie

Girl on cell: Oh, so you really like this one. (pause) That’s cool, where did he take you? (pause) Wow, he must be balling! That place is mad expensive, yo. (pause) What did you say his name was again? (pause, then hysterical laughing) Girl, I can’t take anyone named Skip-to-my-Lou seriously!

–32nd St & 5th Ave

Boyfriend to girlfriend: Well, if I get sick of you I’ll just find someone else!

–Movie Theater, 32nd & 8th

Overheard by: Happy I’m not his girlfriend.

Guy on train: Ladies and gentlemen, can I have your attention? Sorry for bothering you, but I’ve been single for a year, and that shit’s not popping… So, any donations of phone numbers, e-mail addresses, or MySpace pages would be greatly appreciated. Thank you and may god bless.

–C Train

Overheard by: gretchen

Suit on cell: So what does he think, he’s going to, like, eat scrambled eggs with these people and then they’ll sit down and talk about it?

–Shore Road, Brooklyn

Yankee fan: So, we was talkin’ to him and we was all like: "Let’s go to a bar!" And he was all like: "I like poetry" so the guys pretty much ditched him, so I was left with ‘im, and had to talk about his feelings and shit. It sucked.

–Yankee Stadium

Overheard by: I like poetry.

Religious flier nut to friend: We can’t talk about that out here because then they’ll know what we’re about.

–Delancey and Ludlow

Overheard by: Adrienne

Student (shouting): Okay, everyone: I’m doing this whole "day of silence" business so none of you better talk to me! I’m not supposed to say anything and I will be so pissed if anyone of you trick me into talking!

–Millennium High School

Overheard by: I’m staying silent…

Hysterical teenage girl on bus: Well, maybe you should have talked about it before you conceived me!

–M34 Bus

Overheard by: nina

Curly-haired chick on cell: I’m glad I can talk to you about my pubes with such ease.

–Harlem

Overheard by: Nipples McFreaky

Lively black man: My sense of smell is back. I can smell pussy again!

–LIRR

Overheard by: meg

Black girl on cell: …you know it smells like straight bootymeat!

–Times Square

Overheard by: patrick

Obese black woman wearing skin-tight World’s #1 Dad t-shirt: This train smells like urine.

–Downtown A Train

Overheard by: World’s #2 Dad

Guy on cell: Baby, all I’m saying is when you came home last night, you smelled like another dude!

–107th & Amsterdam

Overheard by: HuntingSnark

Woman to male friend: I’ll just have to call you "anus breath" from now on.

–Jewish Theological Seminary, 122nd St & Broadway

Overheard by: Sticking to mouthwash from now on

Woman: I smell dick. (licks her hand, sniffs it) Sho ’nuff!

–R Train

Serious tween girl: I wanna get my braces off. I’ll be able to chew gum and be sexually active.

–1 Train

Old Italian man to young, really drunk Asian date outside of a restaurant: So, you wanna eat or you wanna fuck?

–17th & 7th

20-something girl on cell: So we get done and he’s like: "That was amazing. I don’t even want to know where you learned to do that." Is that a rhetorical question? Seriously, am I supposed to answer that?

–LIRR

Girl to friend: But I didn’t mean to have sex with him!

–Washington Square Park

Hot bald guy: I would have thought hurried bathroom-floor sex to have little ambiguity.

–Columbia University

Overheard by: McFreaky

Woman to mailman: I never reported my mailman, and I was banging him!

–68th St b/w Lexington & Park Avenue

Tourist to doorman, in thick German accent: Excuse me, can you point me to the nearest Hooters?

–53rd St

Overheard by: jillcorp

Tourist taking a picture of her uncooperative teenage daughter: Shut up and pose, or I’m going to pee right on this yard.

–Central Park

Tourist about to take picture with lens cap on: Oh, shoot! Hold on, I have to take the lens cap off or else the picture is going to be really dark!

–Grand Central Terminal

Tourist girl: I don’t get it, there’s so many suits here, I thought Union Square would be full of hippies.

–City Hall Park

Tourist on cell: So far, I’ve experienced coldness and evil.

–57th & 8th

Overheard by: Lag

Hipster on cell: Drunk dialing is the new black. Fuck you. Happy new year.

–House Party, Lorimer St

Overheard by: confabulation Nation

Redhead to friend: I swear we always have orange animals and they’re all called Renae.

–Central Park

Woman to man: There are many things to be sad about. The color of money being green isn’t one of them.

–90th & 1st

Overheard by: Sam

Sad suit: Their yogurt is just too white.

–Outside Pinkberry in Koreatown

Girl: Yeah, my pubes are pink.

–B1 Bus

Overheard by: Robert

Middle aged gay man: Alright! I like colored pens! There, I said it.

–42nd St

Guy: And I was thinking how lucky I was not to have had a bris. That guy had like eight of them!

–Thai Restaurant

Overheard by: sara swank

Girl: Wait, are you circumcised? In the penis?

–Wicked Monk, 86th St & 5th Ave

Overheard by: christine

Beautiful Latina: But my dad getting circumcised at 57 wasn’t even the funniest thing!

–Dallas BBQ, Upper West Side

Overheard by: Ladle

Teen on cell: So, they were going to uncircumcise it?

–Flatbush Ave & 7th Ave, Brooklyn

Teen girl: Oh my god, my circumcised hot dog!

–The Summit School

Overheard by: Michael

CVS employee on cell: Yo, that nigga be gangsta son, he be gangsta. That nigga be circumcised, he all "what?" that nigga fall down, he be "waah, waah" then be be right back up playing an shit. Yeah, that nigga’s gangsta.

–CVS, 30th Ave, Astoria

Overheard by: Robyn

Waspy girl on cell: No, it’s totally safe up here. I mean there are hipsters on the street.
Passing hipster (to friend wearing Members Only jacket): Is she talking about us?

–125th & Park

Shy sounding suit: You know how you get your fingerprints off the gun? You pee on it, the prints wipe right off. Most people don’t know that.

–3 Train

Overheard by: Two Fingaz

Dude: You’re starting to sound like that guy with the gun on your dad’s video.

–Inwood

Overheard by: Rose Fox

Latina teenager to friend: I don’t know why we can’t be having duels anymore. Enough fighting! Just be, like: "Let’s have a duel!" and then go out and shoot each other!

–Rush Hour, L Train

Man on cell (waving his hand around in the shape of a gun): I’ve got a gun in my hand! Oh crap, I mean not a real one. I shouldn’t have said that out loud.

–32nd & 6th

Overheard by: sromeo

Self-important white girl: So then my friends started talking about the shooting up here, and I was like: "Screw you all, you didn’t even call up to find out if I was dead."

–126th & Lenox

Preaching hobo: This year they raise your rent. And the year after. Soon you have to shoot them. You know this.

–34th St & 8th Ave

Overheard by: Rent Controlled

Man: I understand remembering things differently. I just don’t understand how one could confuse being shot at with not being shot at.

–6th Ave & 3rd St, Park Slope

Girl to friend: That’s because my heart is filled with hate and yours is filled with kittens.

–Something Else, Park Slope

Overheard by: jayloo

White guy: Well, if Kate* was my soulmate I wouldn’t hate having sex with her so much.

–W 57th & 11th

Well-dressed man to self, after making meowing noises: I hate my ex, I hate that fucking bitch! I’m going to stick a tennis ball in her muffler!

–Bleecker & Broadway

Teen girl to friends: And she, like, gave me an 88%. I can’t fucking believe her! I can’t even hate her, right? If she’d just failed me like usual, I could hate her. But she gave me a freaking 88%.

–Astoria-Bound N Train

Overheard by: Ben

Sad 30-something: My boyfriend’s mother hates me. She hates me because I’m out of work … And I shoot up in her house.

–7th Ave & 9th street, Park Slope

Drunk angry girl on cell: Answer the damn phone, you bastard! Answer the phone! I hate you! I love you! Call me.

–Port Washington Train