mostly david ephgrave

I’ve already discussed my love of overhearing snippets of conversation on this blog. I don’t seek them out in a voyeuristic, Chuck Berry video-camera-hidden-in-a-public-toilet type way (Google it); they just tend to follow me about. I’m always catching something that sounds bizarre, amusing or mundane out of context, and then tweeting it to remember it. It occurred to me today that, while I’ve documented some of my favourite unintentionally eavesdropped classics here before, I did it nearly two years ago. Bearing this in mind, see below for some of the best utterances I’ve accidentally monitored - and then less accidentally catalogued on Twitter - since October 2013; that’s very specific. "No amount of money would make me work on a Sunday. Unless you offered me five hundred quid." CHILD: "Can we see a clown?" MUM: "No. Sorry. There are no clowns about at the moment." "We're going t...

I’ve discussed previously on this blog how I love overhearing conversations. Not in an illicit FBI-tapping-John-Lennon’s-phone-in-the-mid-70s type way, more when you catch a snippet of a confab out of context. Hearing an isolated nugget without explanation brings no end of entertainment, particularly when you’re as easily pleased as me.  Getting the complete picture can be just as good. Two of my favourite examples took place on a train passing through Stevenage. I’ve presented them below in script form. Feel free to act them out with your friends. It’ll be cheaper than licensing something from Samuel French. Exhibit A: Mother and Son.   The boy, who is about nine, stares out of the window as the train pulls into the station.   BOY:   Is this the place with the stones? MUM:  What? BOY:   Is this the place with the stones? MUM:  What stones? BOY:   The big stones.   Pause.   MUM: No. That’s St...

Listening to conversations on the bus this morning made me think of the Beach Boys song 'I Just Wasn't Made for These Times'.  You could argue that it's my fault for eavesdropping. These interactions were none of my business. To be honest, I can't help myself. I always do it; something I've covered here before. It's often a good source for material.  It was the unnecessary aggression that got me. One couple were swearing at each other under their breath while discussing vegetable oil. The man had bought the wrong brand and the woman was furious. The hissing curses batted back and forth suggested it wasn't about the oil at all, but something much more deep-seated. He’d probably also bought the wrong butter.  A couple of seventeen-year-old schoolgirls chatted animatedly about how the majority of their friends either had children or were pregnant. This didn't shock me. If anything, I was more concerned about...

The other day, as I was working in my office, I could hear a woman outside the window discussing “…that film where Tom Hanks has AIDS, called Twelve Monkeys”. I was tempted to shout out to correct her. Would that have been bad cricket? It wasn’t my place to step in. I wasn’t party to the conversation. Not directly, anyway. It would have made her jump to hear a voice from on high, correcting her filmic mistake. She might have thought I was some kind of God with a penchant for movie trivia. I enjoyed the offensive undercurrent. Did she think that monkeys gave people AIDS? If so, she could do with a little reeducation. Perhaps she thought that Hanks contracted Human Immunodeficiency Syndrome after a dozen-monkey gangbang. I found myself in a similar situation last night, whilst on the train back from London (not a gangbang). The people in front had been to see Jeeves and Wooster in the West End – and kept mentioning that Mark Webb was in it. N...

Anyone who follows me on Twitter will probably have noticed that I have a bit of a fascination for overhearing snippets of conversation. There’s nothing voyeuristic about it. I’m not snooping. I just enjoy the confusion that often comes with hearing a statement entirely out of context.  For a split second you are let into someone else’s world – and just as you’re getting comfortable, the door slams shut, with you left on the outside, trying to suss out the circumstances. The best ones often involve mobile phones. Hearing just one side of the conversation only adds to the confusion. Sometimes, you are left intrigued: ...and other times, the mundanity captures your imagination: One thing all these overheard conversations serve to illustrate is: none of us know what we're doing. We all stumble our way amateurishly through life, trying to make the best of our circumstances. Nothing is rehearsed, and as...