Overheard In September

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I am continuing with my monthly feature, “Overheard in…” It is the tidbits of conversations I “happen” to overhear each month, written down in one place. I only publish the nice ones. If you missed last month’s, here it is. Let’s snoop into September:

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We were at Disneyland on The Pirates of the Caribbean ride. There was a row of four little girls behind us ranging in ages of what appeared to be 5-8. Besides pulling our hair, it was cute. If you are not familiar with the ride: As the ride nears the end, your boat travels under broken bits of wood. There is even a chair hanging. This is what I heard two of the little girls say behind me:

“Is that a chair up there?”

“Shhhh. Yes.”

“What’s a chair doing up there?”

“It’s how this place was built. With chairs.”

It was quiet for a moment as they stared at the broken creation above their heads.

This made all of the hair pulling worth it. I missed snapping a picture of “the” chair. However, I did get a picture of the broken pieces of wood overhead. It made me smile to myself imagining these little girls thinking of rickety rides made from broken chairs. And also, thankful that is not truly the case!

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I was at the nail salon and it was packed. Two older women were waiting to get their nails done together.

The owner was ready for them to go to the chairs and they walked over to me.

Then he seated the two sweet elderly women next to me and told them, “Here you go. Seats right next to each other. Now you can hold hands and sing the same song.”

Now, whenever I go out with my girlfriends, I secretly think of this phrase and laugh to myself.

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At a winery, two middle aged men were standing next to us trying to muddle through a conversation.

One turned to the other and said, “I love the decor in here.”

It was all wood. Stuffy. 1980s lodge feeling.

The other one said, “Me too…But…Wait is that a stuffed cat?”

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Our bug man (exterminator) came around the corner and stopped when he saw us. He paused sheepishly.

“Oh!” He exclaimed. “I hope you did not hear me cursing over there. I saw two alligator lizards on the side of your house. Those things are scary.”

This did not give me faith in my exterminator. My husband said, “Yes, but they eat the bugs.”

The exterminator responded, “They’ll eat ANYTHING!”

I went into the house chuckling. These are the times when growing up in the country pays off.

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We were at a wedding and two young men (in their twenties) were having an interesting conversation regarding the timing of the wedding:

“I can’t believe they are starting the wedding at 6:00,” one young man said.

“Why?” Asked the other young man.

“You should never get married on the hour, because the only direction for the marriage to go is down. A wedding should always start on the half hour, so the hand is moving upward.”

They pondered this for a moment.

“Well,” started the second young man, “I guess she could be late.”

Hmmm. I had never heard of this before. Have you? I honestly cannot remember what time my wedding started. I should have consulted the first gentleman prior to the day (of course, he would have been about ten years old, so who knows what help he would have been)!

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And one last small one. I was at the post office waiting in line to send back two returns and the music got very loud. Who even knew the post office had music? This is what was playing at our local post office:

“Baby Got Back” by Sir Mix-Alot.

Yup.

There was a local police officer talking to a postal worker when the song came on.

The police officer looked at the postman and said, “Interesting choice of music you’re playing here.”

His comment was ignored. But not by me. I smiled…And tapped my foot to the beat.

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Have you heard any funny or nice conversations lately? I would love to “hear” them!

12 thoughts on “Overheard In September

  1. Haha I can’t believe that postal worker didn’t even respond when the cop commented on the music. Maybe he had created a Pandora station featuring it and was personally offended that the cop couldn’t appreciate his taste for bad early 90s rap music. 😉 LOL

    I absolutely love the idea for this recurring post on your blog. I hear the craziest things sometimes; I’ll have to remember them so I can share them with you. 😉

    • Thanks Casey! I was kind of surprised that not only did that worker not respond to him, but no one did. He kind of said it in all of the workers general direction. Pretty loudly. But the music was really loud, so maybe nobody heard them. Or they were engrossed in the song. Either way, it made the whole experience more interesting!

      I am going over to your blog in a sec to leave a comment and talk some “Breaking Bad!” : )

      Have a great day!

      Jenni

      • Haha I feel like sometimes I make jokes in social situations and people don’t respond… awkward. Poor guy.

        OMG wasn’t last night amazing? I was really pleased with how it ended and think that Walt’s demise was absolutely perfect. If you didn’t catch it, you should watch the Talking Bad episode that aired right after it. It was really interesting to hear Vince Gilligan and several of the cast members talk about the show, although I wish Bryan Cranston (Walter White) would have been able to participate!

      • Yes! I loved the ending. I thought it was perfect. I do not think it could have ended better. I missed the after show. I wonder if it is still running. I will have to check! My husband did not like the ending. He did not like not knowing what happened to Jesse. I kind of agree with that, but I am okay with it.

        Have a great night!

        Jenni

  2. Love this recurring post, Jenni! I had no idea about not getting married on the hour. Interesting.Love the Sir Mix-Alot song. Was anybody dancing? Hee hee. I notice that when they play ’80’s pop music in Trader Joe’s everyone walks around singing the tunes.

    • Thanks Cynthia! Yea, had no idea about it either. It was an interesting conversation for two young men to be having. : )

      I love me some 80s music! I was just kind of shocked at the song choice at the pst office! As soon as it started blasting, I looked around me (there was a huge line). I wanted someone else to be shocked like me. But nobody was. I was so happy when the cop said something. I felt less crazy! : )

      I hope you and Marcy have a lovely day!

      Jenni

  3. I can’t think of anything funny I’ve overheard lately but I do often see funny things that give me pause….such as…little flosser picks lying in weird places on the ground that make me wonder, who was flossing here and why. Recent places that come to mind ~~ running trail along a river (now that is one health conscious person. Another was in a grassy knoll in the Staples parking lot. Must have needed to get that piece of meat out before going through the three ring binder isle.

    • Hi Brynne!

      I love it! I think that is so funny! I will now have to look for those. And you have peaked my curiosity. I wonder why they are there! Curioser and curioser. Thanks for the smile tonight! I appreciate it.

      Have a terrific Tuesday!

      Jenni

  4. One of my favorite things ‘overheard’ not too long ago was when we were sitting in an arena waiting for a kids’ show to begin. There was a row of 8 or 9 year old boys sitting behind us and they were talking about the term “yolo”. One boy asked another what “yolo” meant, and the second boy replied “It means ‘you only live once’…(pause)…but you know my mom doesn’t believe that. She believes in reincarbonation.” I almost choked on my soda trying not to laugh out loud…hey wait a minute, would choking on a soda actually BE reincarbonation??? 😉

    • I love it! Thanks for sharing, Holli. I can totally picture it. I love any and every conversation I am not supposed to hear. : )

      Have a great night. Thank you for the laugh!

      Jenni

  5. I haven’t heard of anyone not getting married on the hour. As for overhearing things, it reminds of a slightly embarrassing but hugely funny event about 3 years ago. My wife and I (who absolutely loved her pressie btw) went to Stratford Upon Avon for a long weekend with my parents to see various Shakespeare places. On the Saturday night we went to have a curry in a restaurant.

    We sat at one end of the long and thin restaurant and about 2 tables behind us were a middle-aged lady with her mother. This lady spent over an hour talking quite loudly and mostly likely quite drunkenly about her private life in great detail… to her mother in public and just 2 tables from us, my wife and mother. She was swearing and we all felt her mother should take her home as it seemed clear she had a few problems in her life.

    However having said all that, it was kind of funny and after she left I spent an hour or so doing funny impressions of her. We are all so embarrassed for her, we knew about her money situation, her family and friends, her love life and so on.

    The next day we went to our final Shakespeare sight before heading for home. It was an amazing place, we saw a working 500 year old farm using traditional techniques. I got to hold out a piece of meat and have a bird of prey come land on my hand. Finally we went in the old farmhouse. Each room had its own guide informing visitors of how life was and what various items were for. The last room in the house was the kitchen and who was our room guide? None other than the drunken, dirty mouthed middle-aged lady with a long and complicated private life.

    All our reactions were between laughing and swearing quietly in our heads. I don’t think she recognised us, not with what she was drinking and to give her her due, she was entirely professional and informative but it was hard being a complete stranger to her when we knew every aspect of her life that no-one really should.

    • Hi Stephen! First, I am so happy your wife liked her present. I hope she had a beautiful birthday!

      Oh my gosh! That story is so funny. What a small world. That trip also sounds absolutely amazing. Very cool! There is a place here in the states that does a huge Shakespeare festival. It is in Oregon. I have never been, but my husband has.

      Thank you for sharing! I hope you are doing well.

      Have a terrific week!

      Jenni

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