Funny Panhandling Sign 1

To explain why this blog is called "Bum to Bankroll," I have to first admit to being a bum.  I'm not talking about a guy who sits on the couch and doesn't take showers for three days.  OK, I'm that kind of bum, too. Sometimes.  But in late 2007, I could no longer afford to keep driving a taxi in Orange County, California.  I walked away for both financial and health reasons.  For almost a year, I lived on the streets of Southern California, panhandling to survive.  The streets sound cool in gangsta rap songs.  But they are far from cool in reality.  How did I wind up homeless?  By working 80 to 100 hours a week as a taxi driver.  No booze.  No drugs.  Well, a lot of caffeine to work them crazy hours, but that was it.  I became completely homeless by working more hours a week than most people ever will.  The industry was dying, and I just couldn't scrape up enough money to escape. 

My panhandling sign usually read "Homeless and Hungry."  Simple, to the point, and effective.  But after a while I started putting funny slogans on the back of my signs.  If nobody responded to the front of the sign, I'd show the funny slogan.  It worked a fair amount of the time.  This is one of the slogans I actually used when I was a panhandler.