August 24, 2007
Overheard in D.C.: The Girl With the Thorn in Her Side
As we head into the weekend, we'd like to make a small public service announcement. Though we've been enjoying unseasonably cool temperatures the past week, the heat is coming back, and we'll be back to our usual late August sweatbox by tomorrow. We realize that the heat and humidity can make you cranky and irritable. But we beseech you to try to keep your temper cooler than the air outside. We fully grant you your status as a badass, but you don't have to go around beating up guys who comment on your boyfriend's hairstyle to keep your street cred.
Quote of the Week
Wonderland Ballroom at closing time:
A man with hair similar (if not identical) to Morrissey's walks by a couple of guys.
Guy #1: "Hey, there goes Morrissey!"
Morrissey's girlfriend [screaming belligerently and sporting a black eye]: "Hey man, what the fuck!!! Do you wanna fight?? Why the hell are you disrespecting?"
Guys #1 & 2 [apologetically]: "No, no — you see, we're both huge Morrissey fans. We just wanted to see if your hair was inspired by him. Was it?"
Morrissey look-alike: "Yeah, kinda..."
After the jump, getting the hook up, restroom sorcery, and when you wish upon a fountain.
On the whistle of the wind you can almost hear some things that you should probably send our way at overheardindc (at) gmail (dot) com.
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Pick a standard. Now double it.
Morning rush hour Metro:
Teen girl: "I really want to talk to him about that. I know I've hooked up with 4 guys, but i'm really not that kind of a girl."
Teen guy: "Yeah, if I had the chance to hook up with 4 girls, I would have. But it's different cause you're a girl."
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Some bladders open into the land of Narnia.
In the Men's room at a Nationals game:
Father: "Do you have to pee?"
5 year-old son: "No I don't."
Father: "Well maybe you should try."
Son: "No I don't need to go."
Father: "Well sometimes you have to try. Sometimes there's a magic pee."
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Cynics are born, not made.
At the fountain in Dupont Circle, a father and his 8-year-old boy throw coins in, and then begin walking away:
Father [goodnaturedly]: "Don't tell me what you wished! I don't want to know."
Boy: "It's not going to come true anyway."
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No man left behind.
Union Station Metro platform, ten senior citizens in matching Marine Corps baseball caps and toting Marine Corps paraphernalia scramble onto Metro at the last second:
Metro lady voice: "Bing-bong. Doors Closing."
Marine Vet #1: "Where’s Dave?"
Marine Vet #2: "Who knows."
Doors close. Train leaves.
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And bro probably thought that was pretty clever, too.
Outside Banana Cafe in Eastern Market late Friday night:
Man to his two female companions: "I'm a bro. Not Has-bro. So don't play me like a toy."
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When some people complain that their significant other never takes them anyplace nice, they mean it.
A group of guys were walking down F St. NE, just past Union Station:
First guy: "Hey, I fucked a bitch in that dumpster!"
Second guy, obviously weirded out: "What made you guys get in a dumpster?"
First guy: "Well, it was like, ten at night, you know? Or nine. Or seven. You know."
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Lawn chair psychology.
In a backyard during a party in Columbia Heights:
Dude to female friend: "Of course you don't date nice guys! It'd mean you'd have to spread your legs for them!"
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I usually don't like the bold-type lead-ins, but two this week made me laugh out loud:
Some bladders open into the land of Narnia
and
No man left behind.
Sarcastic as fuck. I love it.
Every pee is a magic pee.
If it's with the right person.
I think you should just start making them up. The real submissions are too depressingly dull.
These were of a high caliber, Ian - job well done! I laughed at least 50% of the time, and it's been a while since I've done that.
I like the nature vs. nurture evidence of the fountain-wisher. But maybe the kid's like his mother - she's never satisfied.
oh boy, comment heaven here:
1) "why the hell are you disrespecting?" god i hate that phrase. i'd give that girl another black eye just for saying that. maybe "why the hell are you disprespecting me" or "why the hell are you disrespecting him", but you can't just leave the word hanging there. it screams for an object! my response might be, "speak english, damnit!"
2) typo in the marine one....i'm sure they were wearing marine corps hats, not marine cops hats
3) banana cafe is not in eastern market. eastern market is a building. banana cafe is either on barracks row, or capitol hill.
I wouldn't have known what Morissey was either!
#4- Thanks for the "job well done", but credit goes to the submissions. I'm just a messenger here, really. This feature is only as good as what I'm sent...and this was definitely a good week!
Thanks for catching the typo, IMGoph.
Yeah the caption on the marine corps one made that funny
IMGoph - you are a tedious pedant. Eastern Market is also a Metro Station, so by definition the name applies to the neighborhood.
How about Dupont? I know, it's a traffic circle, but most people call the neighbourhood between say 14th and the P Street Brdge, "Dupont."
guest 9 -
that's proud pedant, not tedious. please make a note of it.
perhaps that's your definition, but it's wrong. some metro stations were named for the neighborhoods they are in, some were named for landmarks. this is an example of a landmark. i don't have my copy of zachary schrag's "the great society subway" in front of me right now, but i seem to remember that he mentions that the "eastern market" station was preliminarily to be named for the barracks, but the name was rejected for whatever reason in favor of eastern market. can anyone out there verify that for me (i need to get my book back from my friend who borrowed it)?
i know all about dupont, there's no need to lecture me about it.
Actually, Dupont Circle is a neighborhood--at least according to holder of all factual knowledge....
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dupont_Circle
ImGoph, you present a false choice - proud is your opinion of yourself. Tedious is our opinion of you.
The two are not by any means irreconcilable - in fact I'm absolutely confident that they traditionally exist side by side in the case of pedantry.
I thought this was all explained in exhaustive detail during your fourteen-hour initiation into the Pedant's Guild. (Which, by the way, watch it! Using a powerful sarcastic tool like "please make a note of it!" on such a weak basis could bring on a Pedantry Internal Affairs investigation - and I guarantee you don't have that kind of time.)
Though I gotta say, the particular case of saying a *cafe* is in Eastern Market (in the sense of the neighborhood) could legitimately confuse people. , Eastern Market (in the sense of the market) being a place where such a cafe could conventionally be located.
Is Temptation by New Order the best record ever made?
There She Goes by the La's?
Sally Cinnamon by the Stone Roses?
Another Velvet Morning by the Verve?
I can't make up my mind.
Still, at least Liverpool will stuff Keano's Sunderpants. Let's be thankful.
humor is a dangerous weapon to wield on the internet. i'm terrible at it, whether it's actually being funny, or being able to interpret whether or not someone else is trying to be funny. WOV, i'm pretty sure you're trying to be funny. i'll have to go get my handouts from the pedant's guild initiation and leaf through them to see where they brought up the nexus of tedium and high opinions of self.
either way, i guess the point i should have gotten right to was this: i know a lot of people who live or have lived in that area, and none of them ever said their neighborhood was eastern market. they said they neighborhood was capitol hill. i just don't know anyone who identifies with an eastern market neighborhood. does anyone out there want to chime in to tell me i'm wrong?
humor is a dangerous weapon to wield on the internet. i'm terrible at it, whether it's actually being funny, or being able to interpret whether or not someone else is trying to be funny. WOV, i'm pretty sure you're trying to be funny. i'll have to go get my handouts from the pedant's guild initiation and leaf through them to see where they brought up the nexus of tedium and high opinions of self.
either way, i guess the point i should have gotten right to was this: i know a lot of people who live or have lived in that area, and none of them ever said their neighborhood was eastern market. they said they neighborhood was capitol hill. i just don't know anyone who identifies with an eastern market neighborhood. does anyone out there want to chime in to tell me i'm wrong?
IMGoph- you're wrong. There now shut up.
I was. In fact in my opinion it was awesome! Definitely getting into the concept of the Pedant's Guild as a sort of anti-Hogwarts; the least fun club in the world.
But I have, truly, heard people use Eastern Market as a neighborhood identifier. Otherwise, Capitol Hill becomes too big and nonspecific - it describes an *area* that doesn't feel like one *place* - so people naturally pick up the nearest well-known landmark. It enriches the language, provides additional clarity and specificity, and maybe provides an enhanced sense of neighborhood or civic pride - why fight it? (excluding here the Orwellian BS of real estate develoeprs.)
that's the thing...real estate people inventing crap like soflo and cohi to describe places that already have names. maybe my friends are just comfortable with being part of the giant blob that is capitol hill.
it's fun being told to shut up by anonymous wraiths who are too afraid to stick a name on their posts. so NERRRRR....
have a great weekend!
The Hill Rag calls that neighborhood the Barracks Row, Is, Has, and will always be barracks row, NOT Eastern Market.
Eastern Market serves as a qualifier for where on Capitol Hill one lives much less successfully than Logan Circle serves as a qualifier for where in SHAW one lives. heheh
shut up, nerds