I do thank you for your concern, and I don't ask for handouts, not here, not from friends, from people I know personally around me here in Pinellas county, from MySpace, Yahoo, etc. I don't panhandle, I work! I scrap! I work on computers when possible! I do whatever I can to succeed! I don't go after the freebies from the government or even most of the assistance, and the few times I tried, was turned down! I'd rather be in school to finish my education, but can't do that either! Temporarily, it's a lose-lose situation! I gain little and lose more and other lose more and gain little to nothing. Many more have and are joining my pool though, the pool of the poor! They're forced to do it! Enjoy the rest of the weekend!

Wow, speechless! Don't stroke my ego; and I refuse to let it be stroked too much! LOL! Yes, we all would probably have more compassion for others, but too many of the wealthy and greedy don't want that, professional politicians included. Oh, many of them might play a good show of showing compassion, whether like Bush, Clinton or Obama or others, but there's nothing real behind it! If there was, things would be different and better for many here and elsewhere in the world, myself included. The thing is, most employers don't and would never walk a mile in my shoes, let alone [One day wouldn't do it to wake them up!] spend a week in them. They couldn't handle it, nor the work I do currently or some of it I've done. They typically get out of that heat that I can't escape, physically!

Thank you though, and for your concern; however, I have to say that I really don't enjoy life any longer.

For me, I'm going to find and get something better; I just hope soon. I just can't handle another winter on the streets. My hands, arms and feet are starting to feel it and show it too. I stay clean, don't look like I'm homeless [which is a big plus], work a temporary job and I'm trying to save and get at least one certification in either alternative energy, computers [maybe even just an MCP, MCTS, MCDST, something quick] or an ASE certification in the automotive field. I don't know everything, but I know a lot, and have done quite a bit including construction and I'd even work as a plumber or roofer if I could find the work and it was steady. Something will break through for me though. I figure it has to as I tell many that if I can knock off 5, 10 or 30 seconds or more off of start up times on a computer, even new ones, or improve a vehicle's fuel efficiency by 5, 10 or 30% or more, then something has got to give my way sometime soon.

I have another friend here, homeless, or at least he was, also 56, white, been on the streets off and on for 20 years plus! He's good with MS Office, and just got lucky and landed a computer job in downtown Clearwater. The company took him off the streets, looking like a bum literally, put him into a motel, gave him a laptop to work with, and pays him on top of it. As for me, I know five times as much about computers as he does from networking, upgrading, modifying, trouble shooting, web design, page layout, etc., but I haven't found anything. I know a guy that came down here from Pennsylvania looking for work, and now he's been down here looking for five months and no income! It's a tight job market down here, with as many as 500 to 1000 or more showing up for one job. It's not pretty, but it's worse on the families, and I've seen some living on the streets as well. Horrible!

Hey, it's life for some of us, even others who are trying, who have an education even greater than mine, experience that tops mine, etc. I have a black friend, 56 yrs old, on the streets for a decade, fighting homelessness, worked three jobs at one point in the 1990's, then things started to turn down under Clinton as they started to ship jobs out of the country--people have forgotten about that quickly! He's still unable to find a job, gets about a day or two of work every month. He's finally getting unemployment again, plus a decent amount of food stamps and something else temporarily, but he knows as I do, it's not enough. Why get a place and have all his money gone and nothing in his pocket after a month or so? He needs a job; a real one as do I and others.

My fav doctor? Geez, hard choice, probably a close call between Tenant and Baker. I wish he [Tenant] hadn't of called it quits. Regrettably I don't get to watch it much these days, only when I'm staying with a friend for a night, though I might get a portable TV now that they have the new LCD's that are capable of getting the new digital signal and hi-def. I'm homeless for now so it's kind of hard. Laptop comes first though, got to get that back up and running or get another one to use for the interim.

Dr. Who, great show!

"Finally a story to make us smile! We need a break from the typical gloom and doom news. " True!

1000 straight days.. what are you, nuts? :o)