3 ms·

Could you elaborate on this story? I'm very interested.

by liquidm 15y ago

stray 15y ago
Sure. A lot of it is covered in a book I'm writing (working title: The Minglewood Blues)... Things were tough all over in 2000, and the company I worked for held out longer than most. But it died too. And I found myself looking for work at a very bad time to be looking for work. For months I scored a fair amount of contract work - not a lot - but enough to get by. Around August of 2001 it didn't look like things were going to improve any time soon where I was so I developed a plan: we were going to head to the bay area because the bay area always bounces back from a recession faster than anywhere else. We sold off everything except my computer, my VW bus ("Minglewood") and the absolute necessities we needed to live out of Minglewood for a few weeks until I had a paycheck coming in. Two big things happened in September that year and one of those things is that I took a huge gamble and headed to california to look for work. By the time we got to San Francisco we were down to some small amount of money (I don't remember how much) and there weren't any computer jobs anyway. And as luck would have it, Minglewood broke down right after we got there. Oh yeah, and it turns out that San Francisco isn't even in Silicon Valley. Go figure. I ended up doing day labor when I could get it, begging when I couldn't -- constantly scamming for wifi to look for real work. The scary thing about being homeless is that it really sucks to be invisible and that (at least in SF) the way most people deal with the suckitude is with meth or heroin. And most of our friends on the street were junkies. Oh yeah, and heroin is dirt cheap. Dirt, dirt cheap. Cheap enough than $10 will buy you enough to stay high for a week, whiledeveloping a productive heroin addiction. Eventually I figured out how to escape San Francisco: I saved money to take the SF taxi driver course and got a gig driving a taxi - which btw was harder work than day labor and paid about the same. What I did was to save what money I could until I had enough to put Minglewood in storage and buy greyhound tickets back to Arizona. By this time we had moved out of Minglewood and were living in hotels around union square. On escape day, I checked out an ADA taxi (a van) so I could haul all our stuff from the hotel room out to Minglewood. I got everything moved, called for the tow truck and got Minglewood put in storage. I turned in the taxi, met my gf at the greyhound station and left for Phoenix where we at least had friends with homes. And without heroin. Total time in San Francisco: about 10 months. In Phoenix I went to truck driving school and got a gig driving an 18-wheeler. That only lasted 10 days though because I finally scored an interview for a sysadmin gig at ASU. I abandoned the truck in Kansas City and hitched to the greyhound station and had my girlfriend wire me a ticket back home. Another huge gamble and she was not pleased, but this time the gamble paid off with a sysadmin gig that allowed me to participate in NASA and ESA missions.
- dkersten 15y ago
  Thanks! That was really interesting. I take it "we" was you and your gf?
  - stray 15y ago
    Yes - "we" was me and my gf.
    - rabidonrails 15y ago
      Was your gf working also? Looking? Student? Just curious, trying to fill out the story.
      - stray 15y ago
        Not at first. At first she was pissed at me for getting us into such a predicament so I left her to hang out in golden gate park while I went out to scrounge for food, money and a job. Once I had proven to her that I'd eventually get us off the streets, she quickly bored of smoking weed on hippie hill and got a gig as a waitress at Lori's Diner which is how we got into the hotel.

Could you elaborate on this story? I'm very interested.

by liquidm 15y ago

Could you elaborate on this story? I'm very interested.

stray 15y ago

Sure. A lot of it is covered in a book I'm writing (working title: The Minglewood Blues)... Things were tough all over in 2000, and the company I worked for held out longer than most. But it died too. And I found myself looking for work at a very bad time to be looking for work. For months I scored a fair amount of contract work - not a lot - but enough to get by. Around August of 2001 it didn't look like things were going to improve any time soon where I was so I developed a plan: we were going to head to the bay area because the bay area always bounces back from a recession faster than anywhere else. We sold off everything except my computer, my VW bus ("Minglewood") and the absolute necessities we needed to live out of Minglewood for a few weeks until I had a paycheck coming in. Two big things happened in September that year and one of those things is that I took a huge gamble and headed to california to look for work. By the time we got to San Francisco we were down to some small amount of money (I don't remember how much) and there weren't any computer jobs anyway. And as luck would have it, Minglewood broke down right after we got there. Oh yeah, and it turns out that San Francisco isn't even in Silicon Valley. Go figure. I ended up doing day labor when I could get it, begging when I couldn't -- constantly scamming for wifi to look for real work. The scary thing about being homeless is that it really sucks to be invisible and that (at least in SF) the way most people deal with the suckitude is with meth or heroin. And most of our friends on the street were junkies. Oh yeah, and heroin is dirt cheap. Dirt, dirt cheap. Cheap enough than $10 will buy you enough to stay high for a week, whiledeveloping a productive heroin addiction. Eventually I figured out how to escape San Francisco: I saved money to take the SF taxi driver course and got a gig driving a taxi - which btw was harder work than day labor and paid about the same. What I did was to save what money I could until I had enough to put Minglewood in storage and buy greyhound tickets back to Arizona. By this time we had moved out of Minglewood and were living in hotels around union square. On escape day, I checked out an ADA taxi (a van) so I could haul all our stuff from the hotel room out to Minglewood. I got everything moved, called for the tow truck and got Minglewood put in storage. I turned in the taxi, met my gf at the greyhound station and left for Phoenix where we at least had friends with homes. And without heroin. Total time in San Francisco: about 10 months. In Phoenix I went to truck driving school and got a gig driving an 18-wheeler. That only lasted 10 days though because I finally scored an interview for a sysadmin gig at ASU. I abandoned the truck in Kansas City and hitched to the greyhound station and had my girlfriend wire me a ticket back home. Another huge gamble and she was not pleased, but this time the gamble paid off with a sysadmin gig that allowed me to participate in NASA and ESA missions.

dkersten 15y ago
Thanks! That was really interesting. I take it "we" was you and your gf?
- stray 15y ago
  Yes - "we" was me and my gf.
  - rabidonrails 15y ago
    Was your gf working also? Looking? Student? Just curious, trying to fill out the story.
    - stray 15y ago
      Not at first. At first she was pissed at me for getting us into such a predicament so I left her to hang out in golden gate park while I went out to scrounge for food, money and a job. Once I had proven to her that I'd eventually get us off the streets, she quickly bored of smoking weed on hippie hill and got a gig as a waitress at Lori's Diner which is how we got into the hotel.