POST-SCRIPT:  The part about the beer is my imagination running away with me.

I get out of the 96th Street subway station at 94th Street (if you live outside NY, just trust me on this) when I go to the gym.  Invariably, I pass the same panhandler asking for change.  He is not earnest in his request (“spare change?”) because he sits on a standpipe in front of the storefronts and doesn’t really work the crowd.  I feel guilty not giving him something but I rationalize my hard-heartedness by concluding that if I were a beggar I would be the best damn beggar on the street and this guy is so mediocre at his job that he doesn’t deserve spare change.  And this beggar is rather, well, blasé about the whole begging thing.  You see why New Yorkers are a breed unto themselves; we even have jaded beggars.

So far, for a New Yorker, nothing new in this story.  YET.

As I pass him, and he is saying a half-hearted “spare change?”, his cell phone rings and he answers, “hey, where you at? I’ve been waiting for you.”

What, to go out for a beer?  Or does he meet his friend every night and while he is waiting, begs for change?  A kind of “fringe benefit” or “value added” for his wait time?

I couldn’t make this stuff up and I am really sure I wouldn’t want to.