some snippets of conversations I have overheard recently

a little harmless eavesdropping is okay sometimes

I really must recommend you go outside. Maybe not right now. Finish reading this newsletter first, especially if you just got a coffee or a snack and settled in on the couch. But soon. Outside is good. There’s so much stuff to do and look at and experience. You can leave your phone in your pocket for a while. You can make polite conversation with strangers about the weather or the local sports team. You can compliment someone on their shirt, which feels like such a small little thing until someone compliments you on your shirt and you ride that high for the next 48 hours.

Another good thing about being outside is that you can overhear some incredible things other people are saying, which are often improved by a complete lack of context. It’s not about eavesdropping either. I’m not advocating nosiness. What I’m saying here is more along the lines of “bring a book out to a park or a coffee shop and just relax and dive in but be aware of your surroundings in case someone says something that will stick with you forever.” Please don’t be weird about it. And if you do end up being weird about it, don’t tell people it was my idea. These are reasonable asks, I believe. 

Below, I will present a few things I have overheard recently while I was outside, ranked by how likely I am to remember them for the rest of my life. 

FIVE: “I guess she’s pretty but she has dead eyes”

This was two girls sitting at a table near me a few weeks ago. I think they were scrolling through the Instagram or TikTok page of a girl who started dating some guy they know. They were just cooking her. It’s a good reminder that at any given moment two teenagers might be sitting around roasting you for something you said or did or even just your face. Which is… terrifying. Let’s move on.

FOUR: “Hi, bird”

This was a little boy who was talking to a bird while his family was eating lunch at an outdoor patio. He kept the conversation going for a while, too. 

“What are you doing, bird?”

“Hey, bird, where are you going?”

“Bye, bird.”

I love this guy.

THREE: “BRO, I JUST USED HAND SANITIZER”

This was two guys who were outside on lunch break at work. One of them had chicken nuggets. The other dude asked if he could have one. The nugget-haver replied, “I’m not letting you put your nasty fingers in my food.” Which led to the quote above.

What I liked most about this one is that it was pretty clearly just one snippet of a conversation that started when they came in that morning and continued until they left that evening. Just two bros who love each other bickering all day long about inconsequential things. Maybe the purest thing that exists naturally in our universe.

TWO: “That’s what Disney does. Look at Cruella de Vil. If you cut off the ‘A’ at the end it says “cruel devil.’”

This was delightful. I was in a Barnes & Noble zipping my wheelchair around a corner and one dude was explaining this to a guy he was standing next to. It wasn’t, like, malicious or anything. This wasn’t some very intense person ranting about Disney sending hidden messages to children. It was more like the guy had just figured it out himself and wanted to tell everyone, the way a junior in college tries to impress a freshman by repeating stuff he learned in a political science class he took as a sophomore. 

Yes, the man who said this had a beard.

ONE: “You’re not in the NBA, bro”

Again, two girls sitting at an outdoor table near a coffee spot. I guess one of them was dating a guy and wanted him to go out with her somewhere but he said he couldn’t be out late because he had a rec league basketball game the next day. She was flabbergasted. Her friend was being supportive. And then the girl sighed and said the words in bold up there and her friend replied “Literally.”

Maybe one of the more devastating things I’ve ever heard. I think it was the deeply dismissive way she said “bro” at the end. This was months ago. I still think about it once a week. That poor stupid boy. 

STUFF I TYPED

— my House of the Dragon Scorecard at Vulture, which mistakenly attributes a dog-kicking to a ratcatcher (I will remedy this mistake in the next Scorecard)

— my Five Spot newsletter from Friday, with entries about binge-watching and stolen yachts

STUFF I CLICKED ON

— loved this profile of Conan in his second (third???) act in show business, and especially loved Colbert’s description of his comedic style (“all rubber chicken, no knife”)

— I am, of course, thrilled for Alan Sepinwall that his Better Call Saul book is coming out but I remain livid at him for being so productive 

— the internet is apparently obsessed with Nerds Gummy Clusters, which is fine, but I feel obligated to point out that these are just bite-size Nerds Ropes

— bless Vince Mancini and his way with words for this blog: “The Rock’s $250 Million Piss Bottle Movie”

— “Let Jiminy Glick Host the Next Presidential Debate”

— Martin Mull passed away, which is sad, obviously, but it did result in me watching Gene Parmesan compilations, so there’s a teeny silver lining

— no one knows who has been putting up weird shiny monoliths around the world but I’ve been online long enough to suspect the answer will be pretty stupid 

— learned about an albino alligator named Claude

— knuckleball back

— escaped pet donkey found living best life with wild elk

— “I Would Like To Put Lunchmeat On The Cybertruck”

— Roger Federer gave a good graduation speech 

— Teddy Roosevelt’s stolen pocket watch was returned almost 40 years later, which I believe qualifies as a reverse heist 

— Mongolian moon rocks

— a highway sign on I-95 near Philly went up with the word “Central” misspelled (go Birds)

— Starbucks has House of the Dragon drinks but only in Europe???

— woman suspected of illegally riding motorized suitcase on the sidewalk (not guilty imo)

— my internet was out for like 36 hours this week and I spent about two of those hours watching videos of Ricky Jay on my phone, like this one where he whips cards into a watermelon as Jackie Chan watches in delight 

Okay, that’s enough for this week. Please share and subscribe and listen to some things strangers are saying this week.