Robo Hobo Homo #093

I did have some time before dinner came and I had to wash dishes. Until then, I had a few moments and I saw Wagner working on a piece of electronics equipment at the lobby desk. We talked about it a bit. I understood the general principles of what he was saying, so I could keep up, but the guy does RF like no one's business. He's a geeky type and he looks every inch of it. He's usually pretty quiet and exudes a serious anxiousness most of the time, so it was great to see him light up as he described it all.

Apparently, he'd gotten it cheap because it was broken. Once he opened it up, it turned out that the gearing on some of the resistor banks were out. After swapping out the gears it worked just fine and he'd been using it to fine-tune his wi-fi ever since. Well, he'd been using that or one of the other RF Generators he had for that. Dude has a lot of electronics, as I'd learn later.

Robo Hobo Homo #091

After my sandwich break, I needed to get to the business of interacting with a lot of people. I needed engage with people and ask them the favor of swapping watches with me at the last minute. It was awful, but I did my best at it.

It wasn't very effective. I finally had to get with Mike, the guy who handles the lobby watches, to take care of my shift that night and I knew I'd still be spending most of the next day taking care of my Sunday shifts.

The next issue was getting an overnight pass from a caseworker. They're pretty strict about curfew. I guess they don't want guys skulking around at night and doing drugs. Daryl was out for the weekend. The thing is that there aren't any caseworkers here on weekends, so you can't get an overnight pass on a weekend. Plus it was Memorial Day Weekend, so it'd be Tuesday before anyone came back. Down here, you gotta be nimble to take advantage of opportunities that come up and holidays are not nimble.

Fortunately, Brandi was there late. Is three pm late? Whatever the case, she wasn't sure on the overnight working paperwork, but Yesbert, the house coordinator, was familiar with it and helped us through it.

I also made some handwritten copies of my schedule to distribute to Dennis, the chore coordinator, and my case worker. It didn't occur to me that that half of that schedule would have passed by the time Dennis saw it, but I was lucky to get anything done.

It sounds really easy, but there was a lot of running around and anxiety about it. Everyone I've mentioned and at least that many people who are unnamed were performing their own duties, trying to get away for the weekend, or trying to get work of their own.

Worth it though.

Robo Hobo Homo #081

My interview at the answering service went really well. I don't really know how to describe it. My boss seemed reserved and socially anxious, something I could identify with.

He also brought in another employee, asked for her input pretty regularly, and seemed to have a professional, open relationship with her. She continued to provide incisive additions and questions throughout the interview.

We dispensed with the social pleasantries pretty quickly and got down to brass tacks pretty. I'm never really sure in interviews how much is social pretext and how much is actual interview, so I was pretty happy to talk job duties, work schedules, technical backgrounds, and pay rates frankly and openly.

When he asked when I could start I offered--as a show of good faith--that night.

He said, “is eleven tonight okay?”

Robo Hobo Homo #074 Troy's Bong

So one of the guys here, Troy, has a hookah. You might remember him from the racist incident. He was carrying it around. Someone called it a bong because that's what a hookah looks like when you're carrying it around a homeless shelter full of guys who are recovering from drug abuse.

Troy stopped by and corrected everyoneso that they definitely knew this thing he had was a hookah and not a bong. I just happened to be around.

So during our meeting on Thursday, Daryl covers a few basic areas; don't pee in the bushes outside, we still haven't gotten a maintenance guy to look at the hot water knob for the kitchen, only smoke in front of the building between ten at night and four in the morning. Any questions?

Robo Hobo Homo #060

I have five to six roommates at any given time. I could have up to seven. Freddy is only one. The wheelchair guy another (WC). Freddy talks about taking the bus up to the library all of the time. As I sat down at the library, I thought it funny that I never saw Freddy there. "But then," I thought to myself, "I never really look around for him."

Just as I tossed glance over my shoulder I saw him coming towards me. He asked me to watch his stuff for a minute. Sure enough, by the wall directly behind me was a simple chair that had his bag, his cracked tablet (charging), his phone (also charging), and a pile of tobacco on the floor.

I have to explain the tobacco thing. Man, I do not know if I can explain the tobacco thing. In summary, Larry had decided to roll cigarettes inside of the library and left a pile of loose tobacco on the floor of it. All without a single fuck given.

After a few minutes of that, he came back, thanked me, and I went on my way.

Robo Hobo Homo #054

Amongst everything else Tuesday night, I noticed that we were drying dishes on a regular bed sheet stretched across a wire rack. I asked around and no one knew when it had last been replaced. I replaced it Wednesday morning and put it and the aprons we use to do dishes in the laundry room, on the assumption that the house laundry guy would do it, sight-unseen.

He didn’t and I guess I should have gotten with him, but upon further investigation, it was ‘Stache and I just didn’t want to go there. He seems like kind of a dick even on his good days and I while I’m not great with people I think that I can official say that we “have history.”

So I signed up for a laundry slot Thursday to wash the aprons myself (and the linen, if it was still there), but I completely forgot because I ended up waiting for so long to do internet stuff.

Anyway, by not telling anyone about moving the aprons and stuff, nothing got done, the other dishwashers were thrown off and I’m now behind on my personal laundry schedule.

Robo Hobo Homo #051

Look ‘Stache was a jerk about things when he didn’t have to be, but getting a nice meal at the end of your work day when you’re coming home to a homeless shelter full of farting guys is a really small request.

I finished up the dishes, signed it off, and made my way to the lobby to ask the lobby guy if I could write myself up for not watching the kitchen securely enough.

I don’t use the phrase “blew his mind” lightly because people love to say that about the things they do, but this might be the one time I legitimately blew the mind of someone over the age of twelve.

He didn’t know how to react and we talked—very civilly—about it before he got up and got Tosh for back up. They started saying really nice things and other folks were walking by and I—

I tend to get a bit of praise over here. I’ll go over the praise thing later (and the other thing with Tosh. I haven’t forgotten!), but I get a lot.

It was all a bit much, I slid off of the seat with a “This is getting awkward. I’m…gonna go now.”

With that, I took my leave and hit the rack early and unsatisfied.

Robo Hobo Homo #050, The 'Stache Saga, Part II

I went to get Tosh, the guy who runs the kitchen, and there’s another misadventure there, but when I got back, I let ‘Stache know that we didn’t have his meal and that Tosh would be up to get something for him. ‘Stache was angry and asked point blank if there was no meal and I told him no. There wasn’t. That it had been put aside, but someone else had eaten it. He’d signed up just like he was supposed to, but we fucked up.

I should have let Tosh know that ‘Stache didn’t want a consolation prize, but I didn’t think about that. I was just angry that I’d kept such poor control of my watchstation and that now a person was suffering for it.
 
Sure 'Stache was making himself a salad and he was being kind of a jerk about things, but he was right: if he signed up for the meal then he should have gotten it. I was the only person in charge of the kitchen after he cook left and it was my fault he didn’t get his meal.

Whenever Tosh arrived, instead of backing down when ‘Stache vented at him, he bowed up. The two yelled, ‘Stache yelled a little angrier, and eventually things got quiet. I had returned to doing the dishes.

Later, Tosh came in, asking if ‘Stache had yelled at me. He explained that he’d written up ‘Stache for their altercation and wanted to put the screws to him. I evaded, simply saying that I considered ‘Sache’s actions towards me to be reasonable given the context.

A guy shouldn’t get written up twice because we couldn’t make good on our commitment to him.

Robo Hobo Homo #038

After the house meeting, I had to learn how to run the desk in the lobby. It was the standard fare; a demonstration of rules in writing followed up immediately with how 40% of that gets ignored. And I, a robot, get to figure out which 40% that is with no social intuition whatsoever.

For example, you're not supposed to be sleeping during the day unless you have permission. This guy on my left is sleeping in a chair in the dining area. Folks aren't waking him up, but then I don't know if a staffer, like Daryl, were to come by, if they would wake him up and give him a warning, give him an infraction straight up (one of the five needed to kick you out), or simply ignore him. I just don't know because it's all arbitrary to my robot senses.

Anyway, lobby training was pretty iffy, but all my shifts are from 0200 to 0400 on weekends, so I'm not too worried.

Maybe I'll do some ride-alongs in the evening as my schedule permits though.

Robo Hobo Homo #035

The last two things my case worker brought up were actually about finding work. 

Do I have a resume and a social security card? No. I lost my resumes with my good backpack at a gay bar in the city the night before I arrived. I didn't tell him that; I'm not an alcoholic and the how isn't as important as the now.

I'd already told him what happened to my social security card, but he'd forgotten. I told him that I'd destroyed it and he made the exact same face as when I'd told him the first time. He still never asked why, but instead told me to get another one. I'll be doing that Wednesday.

I'm not sure about the copy of my resume. I'll talk about that more later.

Finally, he told me a thing that would help me work to get money from a third party! There's a company that hires folks to work in their lodges during the tourist season and moves them around to different locations year round. If I was willing to travel it was an option.

I said yes.

So he set me up with a computer and I went to their website. Of course their only opening was a fantastic executive sales position so of course I applied to it.

I also took the opportunity to reapply to SafeLink. My application on Saturday had ended on a vague error message asking me to call them. I'd called that afternoon while waiting for Daryl's schedule to clear (no matter what else I say about the guy, he keeps busy) and they didn't have any record of my application.

Starting from scratch, I applied again, this time getting stuck when they asked for me to upload a picture of my Food Stamps card. Now my laptop doesn't have photo capturing software and I don't have a phone to take pictures with, so in order to get a phone to make calls, receive calls, and take pictures, I need to ask someone to take a picture of my Food Stamps card and sent it to SafeLink. It rubs me in exactly 359° of wrong directions, but it's doable.

Eventually, it was time for dinner and I had to take off.

Robo Hobo Homo #014

I've been doing dishes after dinner since my second day here. Everyone staying at Purgatory Shelter signs up for a chore on Monday or Sunday, then they do that chore from Tuesday until the following Monday.

On Thursday night, the guy who signed up for washing the dishes after dinner on Monday wasn't able to do it anymore. I guess with a lot of guys coming and going, those things are bound to happen. I volunteered to help a guy named Nick out with them. He showed me the ropes and we did a bang-up job of it.

So the next day someone asked me to take over full-time on the dishes and I accepted. It's basically like a restaurant; scouring, washing, soaking, rinsing, drying, then putting up dishes for a full dining floor (plus pots, pans, serving trays, etc).

It takes its toll on my hands and my back, but the hardest part is keeping the kitchen secure. Germs can spread easily from the kitchen, so it's important to keep it clear of any unnecessary people who come in.

Folks still stroll in though. Most of them have a good reason. They keep a hot water pot, the garbage bags, and late meals back there. People need access to those things for the sake of keeping the shelter going and it makes sense for someone to jump in, get them, and jump back out again instead of not having them.

Other times, people just want to eat things that they aren't supposed to be eating. I even had the guy in charge of coordinating the kitchen come in just to play some music. If the people who are in charge of enforcing the rules aren't doing it, who will? As the guy doing chores in there, I'm the only one who has a right to be there, but then this isn't an environment where I can simply push back on principle. I mean, I could, but then I'd be climbing the mountain the next day.

I'm learning though and we'll see how well I can secure the perimeter tonight.

Robo Hobo Homo #011

The next group I want to talk about are the bravos. These guys are loud, selfish pricks. They're willing to work and they work hard, but they still have to feel powerful even when they aren't. Shouting, ignoring rules, being gregarious, giving people help, or giving people hard times are all that they're about. They're at the bottom of the social pile, but they still want to be above someone.

The lost. My bunkmate is this one. He's just here to get as much as he can for as little as he can. He can get money from the government, so he will. Surviving is good enough for him. He tried to give me pointers on faking crazy when I asked about getting legitimate psychological help. It was nice of him. I don't judge, but really I do judge.

The final one is sorta my group. The silence. We just hang out, do our thing and don't worry about it. Sometimes that manifests as the same laziness I attribute to the lost and bravos. Well, the bravos want things clean whenever they feel like making things clean and the lost at least like their own spaces clean.

Obviously, I get along best with the other silences, but I should try to approach more of them and get to know them. Well, I should do that for everyone. I should try to meet one guy and talk with that guy every day.

Robo Hobo Homo #010

It's a trope when the protagonist names the broad categories of new things as they introduce the audience to their new world. In this case, I'm going to run down the classes of homeless dudes I've met here.

Now note that I'm not personable, so I don't know any of these guys that well yet. I'm writing at least the first dozen RoboHoboHomos on my first Sunday here.

The first is the mumblr. I've only run into one real mumblr at Purgatory Shelter. Another one followed me on the street Friday. He started telling me about how he got into a fight with his old lady. He mentioned she was overseas. Then he mentioned how tough it was for soldiers overseas. Then he started talking about how they're all a bunch of “hoo-ahs,” which was so specific I became sure he was regurgitating stuff wholesale. It was about that time that I remembered that my top walking speed can outpace lots of folks' running speed, so I gunned it and he fell behind.

The guy I met at Purgatory Shelter was a lot the same. The Mumblr said a lot of things I agreed with, but they were all fragments, words without ideas or structure between them. It was a stream of thesis statements that were spat out between these shutters and slurps that I believe are related to some scars on his face. It took me fifteen minutes of trying to get a word in edgewise before I gave up on that and another fifteen to slowly extricate myself from the social situation.

I have a few theories about mumblrs. The first is that they just want to be heard. They want someone to react to them and engage them on a human level, but the fact that they never shut up or really listen to what their companions are saying fucks them over on that. They talk to reach out, but they never listen to be grasped.

The other theory is that they've been living in a world that doesn't value or listen to them for so long, they just get right to the sound byte. There's nothing else there, so the try to put out the most pertinent sound bytes they can just to get people into their sphere. It's like the first one, but it's motivated by getting people to give up money, sympathy, or respect for their wisdom and attitudes. It's like a “God Bless” cardboard sign turned up to 11 and stuck on fast forward, a survival trait evolved to an unwieldy, counter-productive extreme.

The other theory is kind of why I blog. They have all of these ideas and they want to share them, but they have no idea how to build ideas, connect to an audience, or shut the hell up.

There but for the grace of the gods go I.

For now, at least.

Robo Hobo Homo #007

So I'm not great with people. That's the “Robo” part of the RoboHoboHomo. Technically, I'm not a hobo either; I'm homeless. Anyway, most of my emotions from moment to moment are selected. I am sexually and romantically interested in men, but it's pretty rare that it comes up. I'm just not a people person.

So I'm not great with phone calls. I never have been. I've tried in the past to submit an application and call companies afterward, but it's always been an awkward, pointless exercise. If a company has too many applications to weed through, they can't surely want each of those applicants to call them. “Hey, I sent you an email.” “Gee, thanks buddy. There's been a pleasant AOL voice telling me that since 1993.”

I never saw the point of it, intellectually or through experience.

But there I was, talking to the co-resident manning Purgatory Shelter's lobby, when he mentioned that he'd gotten a job. I asked him about it and he said he cold-called companies 'til one of them mentioned a job and he took it. He said he didn't take “no” for an answer.

I'm a guy who believes in consent. I believe in respecting other people. I believe that if companies need someone, they need someone and they try to hire the most qualified person based on an application, background check, and an interview. I'm also not very good with people.

So I liked this guy's idea, but I didn't think it was really something I could do.

On the other hand, I came out here because everything I had been doing hadn't been working. Now I'm not great with change or admitting I'm wrong either. So, I picked up the communal phone and called the company that had hired him. The lady at least pretended to check their website and said “No,” and I said “okay,” but it was progress.

So whenever I got through with my .pdf run on Friday, I logged off of the computer, went to the communal phone, and called the company. There, I got a guy named “Doug,” who seemed happy about the call and said he'd be looking it over as soon as he could.

I know it won't do any good, but I'm pretty glad that happened.