Tending bar can be a really rewarding career, leading to uniquely intimate relationships will all sorts of great people. Being behind behind the beer lines also lets you overhear all types of crazy stuff. Sometimes it's like getting paid to watch Jerry Springer, two feet from your face.
Steelerfan345 asked bartenders of Reddit: What is the strangest conversation you've ever overheard because people assume sound doesn't travel over the bar?
Submissions have been edited for clarity, context, and profanity.
15. Rude.
Even though we were busy, I clearly heard a women say to her friend, "Hey look, the bartender's really cute."
Friend: "No he's not!"
Response: "Oh yeah, you're right."
Damn dude. That sucks.
I'm sure there's someone that thinks you're cute.
Even if it's just your mom.
14. Is this a good deal? Asking for a friend.
Work in a downtown hotel bar right across from our convention center. I've heard way too many negotiations between businessmen and escorts.
Last one I heard involved the guy asking the lady how much extra she would charge to let his friend watch.
13. Awkward.
Had a husband and wife who were by far the most rude people I've ever encountered, talking with a traveling business man. By the end of the night the business man was propositioning the woman to go back to his hotel room for some money.
12. People are creatures of habit... poor habits.
Lots and lots of cheaters. It's weird that serial cheaters take their girls to the same spot.
"Oh, you changed your hair!"
..."and height"...
..."and race"...
I asked one of my regular offenders about that. It appears that discretion is the most valuable asset to a cheater. So when they find a place that they feel comfortable and the bartender can maintain a straight face when different dates come in, they'll keep going back because it's the "lowest risk" to be discovered. And when I say discovered I don't mean by the main piece but all the various side pieces.
11. Hot take.
I've bartended but my favorite conversation was overhead while I was on the other side of the bar. "Look all I'm saying is Grand Theft Auto severely ruined our generations perception of how many police helicopters exist." Sounded like they were getting really heated over the matter haha.
That's a fair premise really.
10. Talk about inappropriate...
I bartended at a country club, and there was this one group of tennis-ladies that would always sit at the bar and get absolutely sh*tfaced on weeknights at our wine nights. They took a liking to our main bartender and kept calling him exotic (he's Mexican), they would say how love his beard, would talk about their fav (not tennis related) positions, how they kept their nether-regions tidy, slip him their numbers, how sh*t their husbands were, etc. Gave me death glares every time I'd be bartending/bar backing with him lol
The exotic Mexican part got me lol
9. Never trust the angles.
On Valentine's Day this year, we had a guest who accepted a FaceTime from his girlfriend while his side-chick was with him at the bar. He angled the phone so his girlfriend wouldn't see the girl, but it was so obvious.
"Here's your drink, aaand one for your date on the house. Happy Valentine's Day!"
Edit: thanks for the silver, I'm all out of jokes
8. Someone's reference prowess is on point.
Randomly overheard two middle aged women:
"As a woman ages she can choose between her face or her assh*le, but she can't choose both."
I have no idea.
Edit: Just FYI, this was a thing awhile ago when Courtney Cox first started on that show Cougartown because of some press she did that was what I remembered it from to google up this article.
Edit again: this was a thing like 10 years ago. I'm just old so remembered it. I didn't mean to imply that its not outdated now.
7.This is a real profession and now I feel Iike I'm wasting my life.
I overheard a woman who worked for a New Zealand online dating service, and was basically a profile censor. She described her job as being 80% dick pic removal, and had seen so many she could divvy them up into a few distinct categories.
I (a dude) have a very similar, job, and can confirm.
Honestly though, compared to the other things I have to remove, johnson pics are like the best case scenario in my day.
So, what are some categories for dicks?
Hotdog and not hotdog.
6. Well then.
"I hated myself until I discovered masturbation."
Just because I make love to myself doesn't mean I love myself.
5. What a bro.
Two businessmen having after work drinks on a Friday, where the conversation built up to one of the sweetest sentiments I've heard. At first the usual "Lemme tell ya, you're a good person. I love you man." Later on (still fairly basic): "F*ck the wives! Hey, you and me, we buy motorcycles!"
To finally this gem: "If a tornado were to blow you away... I would fly after you."
4. Gurl...
"You won't come home with me because I have a stinky pussy sob sob" - Middle aged woman on a first date at like 7 O'Clock on a Wednesday. The guy was planning on going home with her until that i guess
Now I understand where all the patients presenting to the emergency department with vaginal discharge at 9PM on a Wednesday come from!
3. Ah the butt chug.
"You think they have those straws for sucking drinks in your butt here?"
Wow. Can't compete with that. Don't even really understand that.
Well... did you?
Butt straws aren't really a thing, you're just supposed to turn a normal straw upside down
I mean, if you think about it, the human body is just the world's most disgusting crazy straw.
2. I mean...
Guy: "I think I'm going to need a coke chaser for this one." Girl, presumably SO: "we already did all the coke..." Guy: "Coca Cola, you idiot!"
Not even the most memorable, just the most recent. For sure, a real snapshot into their relationship.
1. This lemon party.
These three middle aged women (alone at the bar) discussing in excruciating detail their sexual fantasies, which seemed to include "sucking off a younger man." I was 22 at the time. They obviously knew I could hear them but it was so awkward. I stood there cutting the hell out of lemons and limes.
Were you cutting the piths off? That might've been what made them hot and bothered.
Nahh I think that would have pithed them off.
