I stopped by a local convenience store this morning. A 50-ish man approached me as I was closing my truck door, and said the following:
“Excuse me. Could I borrow $20? My grandfather needs a new wooden leg. We had to make toothpicks out of the old one to pay the rent.”
That cought me off guard. I kept my composure, and simply said “Are your serious?..No.” I laughed heartily when I drove off. Anyone have any better beggar stories?
Not sure if this is better or worse, but had a guy come up to me while I was eating at a Subway and hand me a slip of paper that said ‘I am deaf. Give me money.’
It startled me too much to give a proper reply, but had I been thinking I would’ve whipped out a pen and wrote back "Sorry I’m illiterate’.
A couple of months ago I was at the laundromat reading a book while my clothes were enjoying their ride in the washer when this homeless guy comes in and sits down next to me.
Homeless Guy: Wow, you’re really pretty.
pbbth: Thanks.
Homeless Guy: Do you have a boyfriend?
pbbth: Yep, sure do.
Homeless Guy: Is he good to you?
pbbth: Of course! I wouldn’t be with him if he wasn’t.
Homeless Guy: Well, in that case, do you have a quarter?
pbbth: laughs Yeah, sure, hear you go.
I mean, that was the most flattering (albeit weird) experience I’ve had with someone begging for change. I figured for coming up with something like that he deserved a quarter.
My two favorites were signs. The first said ‘Why lie? I need a beer’ and the second one was leaning against the guitar case of a very bad musician saying ‘I’ll stop playing for spare change’.
Another is kind of a Grateful Dead meets Jerry Lewis cross from years ago that wouldn’t be funny if you weren’t a deadhead.
Runaway grunge kid, Vancouver, BC, 2002.
Cardboard sign: $2 AWAY FROM TAKING OVER THE WORLD
I gave him $1. I guess he never got the other $1; we would have heard.
A sign saying “Dreams of a Cheeseburger.”
I know one lady who works as a translator for ASL. She tells me the last time someone came up to her and gave her that, she bitched them out in sign language and told them to not be lazy and go get a proper job. (We get people handing out the cards with the alphabet in ASL on one side and a please give me money plea on the other).
He got pretty mad at her I think she said.
There are plenty of deadheads on here. You going to the New Year shows?
I get these guys in the train station sometimes. Last time one handed one of those sheets to me, I said, “sorry, I’m blind, I can’t read this.”
He said “Oh.” And took it back.
Real live deaf guy, apparently.
When I was a med student, I was approached by a guy as I was loading my take-out pizza and beer into my car. He said he had cut his foot on some glass and needed some money for gauze and stuff. Being a kindly future doctor, I told him I’d be glad to go up to the near-by pharmacy and get him some supplies OR drive him to the FREE MEDICAL CLINC that was 3 blocks away, but first I needed to check out his wounds. He actually took off his shoe and sock to show me his wicked tinea pedis before I got in my car and left.
Slightly off track–I got one of those calls years ago from the people selling “permanent” light bulbs. I said, “We don’t use light bulbs.” He asked why, I said we were blind. He had no answer.
One late evening in Missoula this past spring I walked past a drunken panhandler who shouted at me, “Hey, man, you’re going to have bad karma for not helping other people!”
I turned around and said, “My belly is full, I’ve got cash in my pocket, and I’m headed home to a king-size bed and a beautiful woman. Which one of us REALLY has the bad karma?”
I thought it was pretty funny. I hate drunken, aggressive panhandlers.
whistelpig
I had a guy approach me as I was leaving work one day, at a time when I was clean-cut and nicely dressed. Anyway, he told me he was gathering enough money for a quart of beer and would I kindly donate a quarter to the cause? I laugh and asked him why he wasn’t saying it was for a meal and he told me several places to get a free meal. I gave him two bucks, enough for the quart. He told me surely I would be blessed, but I expressed doubts about that.
There used to be a skinny black guy who stood outside the Walgreens on 24th Street in the Noe Valley neighborhood of San Fran. On two separate occasions, his mother died - he even had a photocopied (in color!) death mass program, and on BOTH occasions, the date was from the previous day! He actually changed the date so it would look more recent.
Dude, try that in a DIFFERENT 'hood, next time.
Joe
Once when I was leaving work and walking to my car, a guy sitting on the bench said to me “Hey, do you want to get married?” I said, “No, thanks.” He responded, “Can I have a dollar then?” and I replied “You don’t get alimony if we were never married.”
Shortly after the Waco fiasco I saw a guy begging on a street corner in Albuquerque. He had a sign that said “Founding religious cult. Need money to buy guns.”
I very seldom give to beggars but that would be one of the few times.
Ditto. Man, I would’ve handed over the 20 bucks for that.
In Chicago:
“Have you got any spare change?”
“No, I’m English”
“I didn’t ask your religion, I asked for change”
WTF?
About fifteen years ago I worked at a pizza place in downtown San Jose. One of those government-subsidized-homeless-hotel type places was above us, so we got an interesting cast of characters wandering through the restaurant every day.
Once this guy came in and asked if we sold hamburgers. “Uh, no, just pizza,” I said. He shook his head. “Can’t eat pizza,” he said, pointing to his mouth, “no teeth!”
I was trying so hard not to laugh, I couldn’t ask how a hamburger would be easier to deal with…