FlatMaster

Mistaken for a junky once.

https://www.bikeforums.net/showthread.php?t=570805

Kimmitt 

HNL is changing; there's an increasing transportation cycling culture coming online.

jubal117

I don't get mistaken as homeless as much as either too poor to buy a car or I got a DUI. People at work offer me rides home or money for gas for my car. I just politely decline, but it does get annoying at times. I don't think I have driven my car to work for 5 or 6 months. I think a lot of them figure I wrecked it, or just don't have gas money. Most people, including my wife, just don't get that I enjoy riding everyday. Part of the fun to me is seeing how much stuff I can bring home on my bicycle.

Artkansas 

Someone did tell me once that I looked like the unibomber.

Standalone 

Kind of like how my neighbors look at me when I mow the lawn with a push reel mower... one came over to offer his gas mower!

qmsdc15

A panhandler told me he make $100/day but he knocks off at noon. The problem with apples and Powerbars, now that I think about it, is they require good teeth, which a lot of homeless don't have. I suppose if a toothless guy was truly hungry, he would mash the apple or the powerbar with a rock. It would be like applesauce or peanut butter.

FunkyStickman

You get that too?!?? On the street I live on, I have the only double-lot. All my neighbors use riding mowers. I cut my double-sized yard with a reel mower, or a regular self-propelled push mower, and they shake their heads at me like I'm crazy. Just wait till I sell my car and commute by bike!

I haven't been mistaken as a hobo before, but I had a guy in a big truck ask me how the MPG was, and if I needed a ride. I said "I get 15 miles to one water bottle, and I don't need a ride, my house is only 5 miles from here, it's not far." He shook his head and said "That's not far??"

Artkansas 

They are very afraid that their wives will find out about you and question why their hubby needed to waste all that money on a riding mower.

noglider 

Eugene, OR has a lot of poor and homeless, and a lot of them ride bikes. I visited there for my first time in summer of 2008. I saw one guy with a bike that was towing a trailer, and that trailer was towing another trailer.

FunkyStickman

Funny thing is, I bought that reel mower because my neighbor did yardwork for extra cash. He would break his mower (hitting a water box or something) and borrow mine. Then he started breaking mine. So I bought the reel mower, and told him he could keep the gas one. He never asked to borrow that one, odd...

squirtdad

Enough bikers here that I'm not mistaken for a hobo...although last weekend in filthy clothes from tree trimming I could have been. The helmet must have been the give away.

I just saw guy (probably homeless) in Venice beach pulling 4 red wagons (big ones with the wood side slats) on his bike. Each was packed to the top with skateboards. Not sure whath story is there....he didn't seem to be trying to sell the skateboards, but was having fun giving them a ride.

MacCruiskeen

Here in Cambridge they're not "hobos," they're "graduate students."

noglider 

Do professors still cycle in Cambridge? I used to be the head mechanic at the shop on Mass Ave there, back in a previous life.

Artkansas 

Just last week.

I was riding home from work in a flannel shirt because it was cold and the jeans I wear so that all the grease from my recumbent's chain goes on one pair of pants. I was in a neighborhood with a reputation for trouble at night when I got a flat. I walked the bike to the nearby combination McD's and gas station and plunked down in a corner of the parking lot under a light.

I decided that I would try and keep my hands clean by getting a towel from the windshield washing kiosk. There were none left, and I looked at the garbage section to see if there was a used one. I found one and walked back.

A car honked and a person yelled. But I just walked back to the bike.

After a couple of minutes a car pulled up to where I was seated on the ground pulling the wheel off the bike. A fellow stepped out and asked if I needed help. I replied that I had things pretty well under control. Then he tried to push some cash into my hand. I thanked him, refused his offer and responded that I had plenty of money. I had to repeat it before he would believe it.

So bless him.

noglider 

I just read your story to my wife. We just had a huge laugh, at your expense, I suppose.

Sorry, fella, but you may have a job, you may have a home, you may have a wife and kids and plenty of cash, but you WERE a hobo on that occasion.

dwnptrl_777

I was mistaken for a homeless guy last week while riding the Goat (my Big Dummy). Kid walked up and asked if I needed anything, a coat, etc.


...I smashed my empty bottle of "Mad Dog" 20/20 over his head and went on a rant about my soon-to-be-finished manifesto.

chipcom 

Do I look homeless - or just fat?

qmsdc15

As well you should. Your bike is as much a testament to excess wealth and conspicuous consumption as any other SUV out there.

dwnptrl_777

Ouch. The wink icon can't take the sting out of that statement...

mr,grumpy 

Who would mistake a recumbent rider or a guy on a n extracycle as a hobo? Those things are BANK!

Sixty Fiver

When people talk to me I just mutter incomprehensibly and start to twitch...

My daughters and I were cruising the arts district one Sunday afternoon and stopped to chat with a few young ladies that were busking by playing the guitar and singing (quite well too).

They said it had been a slow day, that they had not made any money, and that their fingers were numb from playing.

I took the guitar and started playing some little riffs and my girls kicked back against the wall and a fellow walking by stopped, looked at the girls, and dropped a 20 in the guitar case.

The next person dropped in a ten.

The young ladies asked if I could come back with the girls.

qmsdc15

Haha, sorry. I meant it in a good way. Nothing wrong with having enough money to set up (pimp ) your utility vehicle exactly how you want it. Beautiful ride, money well spent.

squirtdad

Muscular and well trimmed......which is saying a lot like me....except I have less grey, no sandals and a helmet.

As the saying goes: A smart young man is someone your age who agrees with you

avocado

Haven't been mistaken for a hobo [yet!], but the homeless bike guys give me smiles or nods when I drag the upright bass around in the old burley trailer.

Booger1

I get mistaken as a hobo all the time,every campground between San Diego and Santa Barbara (think ZZ TOP).The cops in my own city think I'm a hobo,and I've had a business here for 30+ years.I go to the Chamber of Commerce meetings and they think I'm a hobo.I've been in the chamber longer than most of the bankers and lawyers there.They always look at me like I'm just there for the food!

I got arrested a few months ago for taking pictures of young girls in PUBLIC(lewd act with a child) when I was taking pictures of cars parked on the sidewalk.The cop took my camara out of my bag and started to look through it.I told him if he didn't put the camara back,I would have him arrested for theft.I said if you want to look at the pictures,arrest me or get a warrent.

He thought he was going to railroad me into county jail.I got arrested,I called my lawyer and explained what was going on.We both had a good laugh.My lawyer is well known in the city,his father and grandfather are district and superior court judges.

To make a long story short,the cop knew he had made a HUGE MISTAKE when my lawyer walked in the door.Everybody in the police station knows him and the family.I told them they had better call the chief,head of the chamber of commerce and the mayor.I want everybody that was on duty here to listen to him apologise to me or my lawyer will be standing tall in front of his father(the judge) with my lawsuit against the city for false arrest.

I saw him at the bank the other day waiting in the ATM line,I got in line and told him I was taking pictures of horses the other day and asked if he was going arrest me for a lewd act with a horse.I could have lit my cigarette of his eyeballs!

I'm the only hobo in L.A. with a custom touring bike....Now's the time of year I become Santa instead!