Series: Benefits Of Being A Hobo

The Places You Get To Go

Just looking at the above picture, you can't tell me you wouldn't mind hanging up your loafers for a few days, grabbing your best pair of overalls, sharpening your sharpest stabbing knife, and heading down the iron highway for a weekend of rails, males and tales--in the heteroest of senses, of course.

Imagine watching the clock Friday afternoon, just knowing that in a few short hours, you're going to be down at the railyard, making sure your belt is secure and unable to get snagged on any loose metal hanging from the train you're about to catch, because you don't want to reach out to grab the train and have it grab you instead--like it did with Big Belt Stumpy Nevada Junior (his father went the same way.)

Can't you just feel the steel on steel cohesion of wheel and rail? Like they were poured together by the builders of the pyramids themselves. Every groove is perfect. Every inch is pure.

Smells like freedom...and some type of diesel.

The only problem would be giving up that first real taste of freedom and heading back to work on Monday.

But that's the life of a weekend hobo, I guess.

(Plus, it's the only way to keep your health benefits.)

Series: Benefits Of Being A Hobo

You don't have to feed fatty.

Not to be too crass, but let's be realistic, being a hobo means never having to buy your child three Double Quarter Pounder Extra Value Meals. And, of course, you'll never have to carry him upstairs to bed when he falls asleep in his bowl of gravy. Being a hobo inherently brings plenty of problems along with it, but at least back problems aren't one of them. (That is, back problems that come from carrying a large child upstairs, because, for a hobo, "there is no upstairs, there." People say that you'll never see a fat hobo, but that's not true. Some fat people become hobos, but hobos rarely ever become fat. Nobody overindulges on dumplings or biscuit-halves. Well, nobody except Biscuit Thompson, who was said to be the "biscuit-eatingest s.o.b. to ever set foot between the rails". Although, a cursory Google search of "Biscuit Thompson" only turns up a "Thompson Biscuit Company"...wait a second...you don't think...?

Series: Benefits Of Being A Hobo

You'll never have to be strapped to another man and thrown out of a plane.

Now I'm not saying that at some point in a hobo's life that he won't be enlisted and thrown out of planes, but I seriously doubt he'd be strapped to somebody else when it happened. And certainly not strapped to either Will Ferrell or Moby. Consider yourself lucky.

Series: Benefits Of Being A Hobo

You are on the cutting edge of bologna science.

While we sit here in our living rooms and offices, the American hobo is out there developing new and stunning ways to prepare bologna. While we stew in our obliviousness, hobo chefs are inventing the unimaginable--and making it delicious! I'm a child of the 80s, so the only thing cutting edge in the 80s was tv shows about advanced vehicles. I'm not downplaying its importance in American history, but it's nothing like being a child during the beginning of space exploration. And to me, being at the forefront of bologna advancement has to be similar to being at the forefront of the space program. Sadly, through research, I have found that over 39 hobos have lost their lives trying to get the most out of bologna. (It should be noted that 38 of those deaths were due to somebody attempting to steal their bologna, and subsequently stabbing them to death.) But the bologna engineers push on because it is all they know. Well, they also know stabbing, but that's beside the point--sort of. But getting back to the beneficial aspects of being a hobo, imagine getting to see blockbuster movies months before they're released...that's what life is like for a hobo. You get to experience bologna blockbusters long before they hit the gas stations or railways. Lucky!

Series: Benefits Of Being A Hobo

Bill Walton won't criticize you for your performance.

I have been criticized by folks in my time, and it's not fun. But I have never been criticized by Bill Walton. Now I don't take that to mean that he approves of what I do; I take it to mean that he has no idea who I am. And in this sense, I know what it feels like to be a hobo. And you know what? It feels pretty darn good. Hobos never need to feel the sting of being told to "get a rebound" or "make a shot". Walton will never walk up to them and tell them to "fry that dumpling" or "ferment this orange". I'm not saying the hobo life is an easy one, but not being critized by Bill Walton has to make life a little bit easier than it otherwise would be.