"It takes a smart guy to play a dumb one." -Laurence Tureaud

When I was about 25 I was on a business trip in Toronto. I was going through the airport on my way home, and there was a big guy wearing ragged, garish weight lifter pants (remember those?), a big baggy coat with a hood, pushing a shopping cart filled to overflowing with an assortment of random crap.

I looked at this guy shuffling along, his cart with clothes and paper bags, a piece of PVC plumbing, stuffed animals. I remember thinking how different Canada was. Here was a homeless guy just hanging around the Toronto airport concourse. Minding his own business, maybe just staying warm.

A while later I got on my flight. Passing through first class on my way back to the more compact seats, I found this guy. The same guy. In first class. He was in one seat, and a bunch of the crap from the shopping cart was in the seat next to him.

Eventually curiousity won, and I went back and talked to a flight attendant - about the guy and his stuff in the other seat. "He paid for two seats" she told me. "It's Mr. T."

And that's what I get for pityin' the fool.