Not exactly an argument, but I once overheard a restaurant owner bribing a cop. It was an Italian restaurant in San Francisco. Kind of unsettling, but the food was great, and reasonably priced. 4 stars.

I was sitting in a restaurant, when the people on the next table discussed how to suppress certain topics from a minister-level EU meetings, as one person wanted to delay any action on that. The discussion also involved passing an envelope, and the one person covering the rather substantial bill.

I was walking through own of the dodgier parts of my city fairly late at night with not too many people around. I could see these 2 drunk weirdo guys with a kind of homeless vibe. There was an older guy and a younger dude, sitting on a bench, I could hear the older guy. Imagine this with a thick crocodile Dundee Aussie accent.

“I don’t believe it, I CAN’T believe it, after all I’ve done for you. I was nice to you. I bought you cheese, I… … …”

An awkward 4 to 5 second silence followed as it slowly dawned on the older guy that his list of benevolent acts only had 1 item before he followed up with

“I bought you CHEESE mate!”

I was in Spain, waiting outside a tournament venue for Magic: The Gathering. Two guys were talking, presumably in Spanish. I knew no spanish, but I could tell the one guy was really excited, almost choking back a laugh while speaking quickly and loudly before he held out his hand vertically, swung it left and right like a table tennis paddle while loudly exclaiming “RAGARAGARAGARAGA”.

The other guy was listening closely with a completely unfazed expression.

Their conversation continued.

At that point, I started to wonder: what were they talking about? What kind of conversation could lead to that motion and that complimentary sound to be adequate? Why was the other guy seemingly so unamused when the first guy was so excited?

This happened probably around 10 years ago, and it bothers me to this day. I will never know for sure, of course, but I have yet to think of a single topic which could reasonably prompt that interaction.

I don’t remember the specifics of it, but I do remember overhearing two people arguing about a video game that I was super into at the time while having breakfast at an ihop, and neither of them knew what the fuck they were talking about.

If I was an extrovert, I would have been compelled to interrupt just to correct both of them. Instead, I posted about it to Reddit.

I got involved in a argument between two older people about whether the earth rotated or not.

The very strange thing is that after I confirmed to them that the earth did indeed rotate and that is why the sun would rise in the east and set in the west, that was the end of the conversation and they thanked me and moved on.

“Look man, all I’m saying is that if it wasn’t for that song most people wouldn’t even know how to spell bananas”.

Not one I overheard but one were I was overheard. In Paris at a restaurant where my girlfriend and I (anglophones) commented on the couples baby beside us. She said it was such a cute baby. I countered the most babies are cute so it should go without saying. You really only have to comment when they are butt ugly like in Seinfeld. It was a fun discussion which made us both laugh. Mid meal the couple got up and said in English that they enjoyed it too.

“it was an awkward gesture or autism or someting…”

Not one that I overheard but one that I was involved in:

I said that I didn’t like bright yellow. This apparently was extremely offensive to the friend I was dating at the time and he had to convince me that I was wrong and there is no room for opinion on the matter of color preferences.

Not an argument but I once heard my neighbor casually (but loudly) discuss with someone how she could only orgasm anally

I speak Russian due to having lived under Soviet occupstion and constantly overhear Russian tourists while traveling in Asia and honestly I wish I couldn’t understand because they argue over the dumbest shit. Now I’m in Thailand and the theme is price measuring everything down to the cents. I’ve heard several loud arguments over whether a thing is cheaper here than at home etc it’s so weird. I get that Russia is going through an economic crisis but why you’re traveling at all then.

I had an argument with my partner that they got to sit in bed on their phone for 10 minutes while I had to get up and care for the newborn. They were paying bills. I was still jealous. The argument ended with us both agreeing we were tired and would send the kid to daycare and nap.

If specific people existed when they where right in front of them existing. Those people are LGBT people and it’s happening to much.

Is a hot dog a taco? Heard that one at dinner tonight.