Photo by [F]oxymoron.We all know Metro’s got problems. That much is obvious. The important thing is that they admit it: after all, that’s but the first step to recovery. Right?
Overheard of the Week
Riding into the city on the Red Line, sitting nearby the emergency speaker phone. A Metro worker walks up and presses the emergency speaker button and shouts, “Calloway! Calloway, Hey Calloway!”
No response.
Metro worker repeatedly and aggressively pushes the button and shouts
for “Calloway! Calloway!” again.
Metro worker gives up, exclaims “Hrmph, these things never work!” and then goes to sit down.
Keep reading for lots of funny kids, an Overheard staple and a lot more Metro.
Overheard in D.C. depends on you to send in the funny and weird stuff you hear. But make sure you tell us who said it, where and in what context.
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We call that the “journalist’s special”
6-year-old kid, eating a hot dog, about 6 p.m. on a weeknight, sitting on a park bench on 17th Street by the White House:
“This is the best dinner ever!”
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Insert joke about Virginian dependency on cars
On Orange Line to Vienna during rush hour.
Young tourist boy, probably around seven, while train is stopped in between stations:
“I think we’re getting gas.”
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Rediscover the bus, indeed
On a 32 bus headed southeast, three teenage girls talking really loudly and using a lot of slang:
First girl: “Shhhh, be quiet.”
Second girl: “Whatever, everyone knows the bus is ghetto.”
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Say hello to Richard Sarles for us
Three European tourists after the fireworks on the 4th are power walking up 5th Street NW away from the Mall, pushing through the crowd trying to get to the Metro before everyone else. Three minutes later, the three are on the corner of 5th and G Streets NW looking at a map clearly trying to figure out where the Metro is as everyone is passing them.
European tourist father: “There’s the metro.”
Family takes off at a speed walking pace into the Metro HQ building, and after a few minutes of trying to find a door, actually enters it.
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Adventures in bus operation
Morning rush hour, on the 7W express bus to the Pentagon. Driver makes a right turn on to Mark Center Drive, then motions to a lady in the front row to come forward. She doesn’t move.
Bus driver: “Excuse me. [no one looks at him.] Excuse me! [He continues driving.] Was I supposed to make that turn?”
Everyone within earshot on the bus: “NO!!!”
Bus driver: “My bad!”
Lady in the front row: “Tell that to my boss when I walk in late.”
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Too cool for school
Teenage boy to the rest of his school group:
“This place is overhyped. Everything that goes down happens on that side (pointing in the direction of the White House). This is the just Capitol. I mean, no one even goes here.”
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D.C. Geography: How Does It Work?
“It’s funny because where I come from people just use North, South, East, West. But here no one seems to. Everyone always just uses NW, NE and stuff!”
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Nah, I just want you to put it out there
Conversation between a 20-something male (carrying a case of beer) and 20-something female on Friday evening in the Ballston area of Arlington:
Girl: “I know I have it in me, but I am just not willing to put it out there.”
Guy: “Well, girls in L.A. are totally different. I mean, they are like, WA-BAM!”
Girl: [after a short pause] “How do you know this? Have you ever been to L.A.?”
Guy: “No, but my brother has visited and he told me all about it.”
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An Overheard staple
Two 20-somethings talking at restaurant in Adams Morgan:
Female: “Yeah, I’m actually from D.C.”
Male: “Oh? Maryland or Virginia?”
Female: “Annandale, Virginia.”
Male: “Oh…so you’re like really a local…wow.” [Zero sarcasm in his voice]
Female: “Yeah, I am. It’s like 20 minutes from here.”
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Wocka wocka wocka
A twenty-something married couple and friend on Georgia ave near G-Spot.
Wife: “G-Spot bar!?!”
Friend: “Yeah, that’s where I was going to take hime for his bachelor party last month.”
Wife: “He wouldn’t have found it anyway…”
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Don’t do drugs, kids
Tuesday, two twenty-something male employees of Shake Shack are at Au Bon Pain around the corner, taking a shift break:
First guy: “I was like, having a conversation with myself and with this other chick at the same time!”
Second guy: “Whoa. I’ve done a lot of speed in my life, but it never made me hallucinate conversations.”
First guy: “Yeah. And I was keeping time by watching the door opening and closing.”
Second guy: “Oh okay. So, like, “as the door flies” instead of the crow.”
First guy: “Yeah. Totally.”
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It’s almost as if the whole world has gone mad!
On the Orange Line at Vienna on Wednesday at 5 p.m. A very nervous Fairfax woman on the phone, riding the Metro for the first time because of the traffic on 66 due to the shut down of 495 recounting the ordeal to her waiting date:
“So I put in my money to the machine to get a ticket and it spit out this cascade of coins at me. And, not even REAL coins…I mean, what the heck am I going to do with 3 golden dollars?!?!”
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‘Cause, you know, who hasn’t fallen there?
Two girls walking by Dupont Circle, Thursday around 5:15 p.m.
First girl: “My roommate had to take me to the emergency room.”
Second girl: “What happened?”
First girl: “Well I was dancing on a DJ booth at a frat house and I fell off. When I went to the emergency room, the doctors said I had a mild concussion.”
Second girl: “What did you tell your parents?”
First girl: “Oh, that I fell in my kitchen.”
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Road rage starts early
Riding on the Green line, a very small boy is pretending the train is a car he’s driving.
When the train starts to slow down: “Vrrrrrm…Beep beep! Get off the road, you asshole!”
