Make Money Panhandling #5: Street comedy and performance art

Back in 2010, when I started really learning about blogs, I started a blog called "Make Money Panhandling," just to see if  I could get that phrase to the top of Google results.  It was a total joke.  A photo of me holding the "bikini wax" sign above got over 10,000 page views alone on that blog.  And the blog topped the Google results for a couple years, until I took it down.

Once I wrote a couple of posts, I realized that I had a lot to say about panhandling and homelessness.  I even got contacted by the producer of the John Stossel Show when they did a show called "Freeloaders."  We traded emails and I answered all his questions about panhandling and gave him a bunch of background info on how people wind up in that situation.  In the show, John Stossel himself dressed up (ok, dressed down) and panhandled himself. 

I started panhandling for food money in Orange County, California to simply survive.  I soon found that with a funny sign, I could actually make complete strangers smile or laugh.  Try it some time, it's really not that easy.  I could actually give something to the hundreds of cars going by, even if they didn't give me anything.  I was the homeless guy, but all the people driving to and from worked always looked way more depressed than I felt.

When I wound up panhandling legally in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, I could stand on the same ramp, day after day.  I actually had fans.  There were commuters and route drivers who told me they looked forward to my signs every day.  You've never thought of panhandling that way, have you?  I've come to see funny panhandling signs as a form of folk art.  The same is true of protest signs.  After a while, I didn't think of myself as a panhandler, I thought of myself as a homeless stand-up comic and performance artist.  Some days I just mess with people, I'd hold a blank sign, or a sign that said, "Don't give to panhandlers," or I'd turn around with my back to people.  A couple times when people rolled down their windows and talked, I gave them a dollar if they seemed to be having a bad day.

As a writer, I've spent my life learning about human nature, and panhandling turned out to be a really educational experience.

Don't panhandle unless you're really homeless or down and out, OK?

Make Money Panhandling #2: When technology bites

Of all the funny signs I used panhandling in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, the "Lexus" sign above got the best reaction from people driving by.  Even cops rolled up and took photos of it.
 
I went back to taxi driving in 2003, focusing on Huntington Beach, California, but it took me all over Orange County, and occasionally into L.A. County.  But right after I got started again in '03, the taxi company put dispatch computers in our cabs and took out the old radios.  That changed everything, LITERALLY overnight.  The computers were programmed to take rides from the good, veteran drivers, and give rides to the lame ass new guys.  The computers also allowed the taxi company to put an unlimited amount of cabs on the road. 

More cabs meant less business per cab, but our weekly lease stayed the same and gas prices went up.  I knew I needed to escape soon, but just wasn't able to.  I'm just one of the millions of people whose job was destroyed by technology.  So, without drugs or alcohol in the picture, I literally worked my way to homelessness.  To be completely honest, after working so many hours for so long, homelessness kinda felt like a vacation.  Well, except for the constant threat of death or dismemberment by cops, thugs, wild animals, stray dogs, spiders, and snakes. 

Make Money Panhandling #1: When hard work doesn't pay off

Are you looking for a new way to make some money?  Are you a self-starter?  Do you like to work on your own?  Do you like the outdoors?  If you answered "yes," then maybe panhandling is for you.

Back in 2007 after years struggling to get by as a taxi driver living in my cab, I had some serious health problems.  My sluggish lifestyle of working 14 to 18 hours a day, seven days a week, led to me gaining over 150 pounds and getting a serious bacterial infection called cellulitis.  The first bout nearly killed me, because I didn't have health insurance, so I just lay in my taxi with a fever of about 105 for five days.  I finally went to the emergency room, and luckily I was covered by some insurance for homeless people.  Three days in the hospital and a week on my boss' couch, and I was back to the crazy taxi lifestyle. 

I had that happen two more times that year, and went straight to the ER both times.  On my last visit, the ER doctor told me that if I kept up my crazy taxi lifestyle of not enough sleep, bad food, no exercise, and high stress, I was going to die.  "In months," he added, "maybe weeks."  After another month in the cab, I decided I needed to quit.  After four years of working 70 to 100 hours a week, paying $550 a week for the taxi and $300 a week for gas, I gave up.  I rolled into the taxi yard, threw my stuff in my backpack, turned in the keys, and walked out onto the streets of Orange County, California with $15 to my name.  I weighed 365 pounds, I could barely walk because of severe athletes foot (which is pretty funny when you think about it), and I expected to die within a few weeks.  I started panhandling for food money, just asking people for change at bus stops or gas stations.  I slept in the bushes.  After a few days, I decided to "fly a sign" as we say in the panhandling business.  A piece of cardboard, a pen I had in my pocket, and an off ramp, and I was in business. 

Don't panhandle unless you're really homeless of down and out, OK?