Overheard In New York

Archive for the ‘Wednesday One-Liners’ Category

Welcome to the Wednesday One-Liner Positioning System

Girl on cell, looking for her friends: Can you see me? Look at the sun, I’m directly under it right now.

–Sheep Meadow, Central Park

Guy on cell: Yeah, we’ll go now. Okay. Right now, I’m at 116 and Hamsterdam – Hamsterdam? What the fuck did I just say? Oh, wow, that is a disturbing mental image. Yeah, exactly. River full of hamsters. Okay, see ya.

–116th & Amsterdam

Overheard by: That would be truly terrifying.

Harlem woman on cell: Come find me! I’m on the downtown side of the street!

–East Side

Drunk guy on cell: Yo, I’m on the corner of fuckin’ somethin’ an somethin’.

–42nd St & 5th Ave

Drunk on cell: Where am I? Where am I? I’m at the corner of Charles Street and motherfucking I don’t know!

–West Village

Woman to friends: Oh thank god! I feel so much safer now that we’re at 7th Avenue.

–G Train

Slow: Wednesday One-Liner-Xing

Mom to seven-year-old crossing street: Be careful, dear. You don’t want to get run over or we can’t have sushi.

–78th & Amsterdam

Cute girl halting before crossing into oncoming traffic: Okay, perhaps we should not die today.

–42nd & 8th

Overheard by: Traffic

Father to son running towards intersection: Remember! A foot in the street means a foot in your ass!

–57th & 4th, Bay Ridge, Brooklyn

Chick zig-zagging across street: I just cannot get down with manholes! Scary, scary manholes. I try to avoid them at all costs.

–83rd & Broadway

Bored cop on megaphone: Please walk on the sidewalk. Stop walking in the middle of the street… Stop walking in the middle of the street. Use the sidewalks… See how you’re on the black pavement? You want to be on concrete. See the cars trying to run you over? That’s ‘vehicular traffic.’ Get out of its way.

–Next to Radio City Music Hall

Boyfriend following jaywalking girlfriend: That’s illegal. [She ignores him.] That’s illegal!

–6th & 4th, Park Slope

The Biggest Wednesday One-Liner

Girl to friend: Is there a way to block fat people on OkCupid?

–Bedford Ave & 8th

Girlfriend to boyfriend: Remember the other day when you told me I had a fat ass and I didn’t curse you out? So now you gonna buy me something.

–Pizzeria, 77th St & 1st Ave

Overheard by: Eric

Older woman waiting for a seat: Oh good, the fat one got up. Shit, an even fatter sits down.

–JFK Airport

Overheard by: Henry Pena

Posh-looking Asian chick: But he consumed over 6,000 calories a day, so he deserved whatever he had coming.

–Park Slope

Overheard by: Ladle

White hip-hopper on cell: Yeah, she’s so big I thought there was two of her. Then I realized she was a dude!

–Broome & Forsyth

Overheard by: Terry

Wednesday One-Liners for Vanessa Hudgens

Girl on phone: Well then, riddle me this, smart guy: why’d I wake up naked?

–Smith & Sackett, Cobble Hill

Overheard by: Swimfan

Girl: Oh my god! I can’t wait to see them naked!

–Elevator, Times Square Arts Center

Overheard by: Natalie

Museum worker: And then I woke up buck naked in a hotel, and there were pictures of me all over the room.

–Museum of Art and Design

Guy: No, I will not do it in here again. Just because I’m wearing nothing under my jacket, doesn’t mean I’m going to flash a crowd of people in every store we enter. I’ve done it three times already. Get your rocks off some other way.

–Columbus Circle Mall Escalator

Overheard by: Martin

Drunk girl at NYU protest: I don’t even know why I’m here, I just want to take off my clothes!

–NYU Kimmel Center

Overheard by: Lilo

Girl on train: Oh, hi! I didn’t recognize you with your clothes on.

–A Train

Overheard by: Don’t even wanna know

Girl on cell: So I’m gonna be naked, but that’s okay, I’ll be wearing rollerblades.

–N 4th & Bedford Ave

Wednesday One-Liners, Not Drugs

Muscle man to another: You have to hug me more!

–18th & 6th

Overheard by: Joe Fenton

Hobo: I won’t hug you if you give me money.

–6 train

Overheard by: Gabrielle

Little tourist girl, arms outstretched: Mommy, I just want to hug New York!

–49th, between 6th & 7th

Overheard by: Scarfish

Lesbo on cell: I just hugged a man. I don’t even know him!

–Christopher St

Overheard by: Jericho n’ drop

Panhandler: If you don’t have money and you’re fairly attractive, give me a hug and we’ll call it even.

–F train

We Prefer to Think of Wednesday One-Liners as “Found Art”

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

One Liners from the Legitimate Wednesday

Student, about her play: I want the audience to enter through the vagina before they sit down.

–NYU

Guy to younger girl, at intermission of Spring Awakening, right after sex scene: So you had to choose this? We couldn’t have gone to see The Little Mermaid?

–Eugene O’Neill Theatre

College student: …exactly how you’d expect a college rendition of The Vagina Monologues to go.

–NYU

Black guy on cell: It doesn’t mean I’m gay because I’m going to see a play. (pause) It’s for a class… There’s nothing wrong with wanting to see a play.

–Union Square

Overheard by: erkala

20-something guy to friend: Picture it; Fishsticks: the musicical!

–63rd St & Broadway

Wednesday One-Liners Tartare

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

Wednesday One-Liners Say “Toro, Toro, Taxi!”

Little girl to father, about pedestrian sign: But I don’t want to be a pedestrian! I want to be famous!

–17th & Irving

(pedestrians are crossing when they aren’t supposed to. One almost gets hit by a taxi)
Female traffic cop to taxi driver: Next time, just go ahead and run them over.

–Columbus Circle

Overheard by: momes

Homeless man directing traffic in middle of street: I killed 20,000 people, I ain’t afraid of no car! I killed 20,000 people, I ain’t afraid of no car!

–Jerry Orbach St

Gangster walking in front of Range Rover: Fuck it, if I’ma getting hit by a car, I’ma getting hit by a nice car.

–Broadway & Houston

Tourist driving car: I don’t give a fuck if you own the world! I’m running your ass over!

–Financial District

Overheard by: lex