From today’s “Metropolitan Diary” in the NY Times…

Dear Diary:

After picking up my wife’s dry cleaning, I boarded a crowded but not crammed N train at 57th Street to join the evening rush hour. To keep my wife’s sweaters above the fray, I held them aloft in the same hand I used to grip the train’s center pole.

We left the station and the car was quiet until a large, dreadlocked man in the seat nearest to me said to his similarly styled friend in a lilting Jamaican accent, “You, my friend, are soft and cuddly as a kitten.”

To which the man replied, “No, it is you who are soft and cuddly as a kitten.”

This being New York, no one stared or turned their heads even as this repartee repeated itself. Back and forth they went, each kindly demurring to the other. “No, no, you are the softest and cuddliest kitten I know.”

Looking for a place to train my eye, I stared at the dry cleaning I was holding aloft, and saw that the plastic bag covering my wife’s sweaters bore a picture of a small cat playing with a ball of yarn, beneath which read the words, “Prepared just for you, soft and cuddly as a kitten.”

I turned to the two men, who were smiling back at me.

“Ha, ha, we got you, man!” They clapped their hands and then, along with most of the folks in our car, burst into laughter.

Paul Gordon

From this week’s edition of Octagenarian Ladies Who Say “Isn’t New York Wonderful”…I mean, the NY Times’ “Metropolitan Diary.”

Dear Diary:

It’s 7:45 a.m. on a hot, sultry July morning. I’m standing on the platform at the Larchmont station waiting for the train to Grand Central.

I notice a girl about 17 or 18 years old wearing a sundress with a bright floral print. She looks out of place in a scene that is populated by grim-looking commuters, thumbs already moving in vigorous unison on their BlackBerries.

She’s talking to a boy of a similar age, who is wearing an ill-fitting suit. I imagine she has just finished high school and is working a summer job in the city.

As the train enters the station I catch the tail end of her conversation with the boy:

“Do people really do this for their whole lives?”

John Hull

From today’s edition of “Nonagenarians Saying “Isn’t New York Just the Most Wonderful Place?”…I mean, the NY Times Metropolitan Diary:

Dear Diary:

Returning home from the East Village on a Saturday night last month, my friend and I boarded the L train at First Avenue. Just after we sat down, the entire packed car started screaming, and a wave of people, beginning at the opposite end of the train, began frantically running toward my end of the train and out the door.

Instinctively knowing exactly what would cause such a reaction in a group of late-night New Yorkers, I ran out of the closest door to safety.

Seconds later, following in my path, a rat ran out of the train and down the platform, but not before bumping into my friend’s leg. Despite my longstanding rat phobia, I must admit that amid a large group of screaming, running people, the rat looked pretty small and harmless.

We reboarded the train, all anxiously awaiting the closing of the doors, and as the train pulled out of the station, the car was abuzz with laughter, excitement and the recounting of this most recent New York tale.