The Better Beggar

The traffic tonight was horrendous as soon as I got on the tollway at Mockingbird, so I quickly exited Northwest Highway to take a speedy stroll up Inwood.  In doing this, I was faced with a situation that made me think way too long, which is pretty typical of me.  

On the corner of NW Highway and the tollway, I saw two homeless men panhandling for some spare change.  Now, I couldn't figure out why they would work the same corner, because I barely give any one person change, and I would do it much less if I had two people to deal with or choose between.  But then as I thought more into it, I wondered who had more change.  I went down a long list of factors evaluating who might be making a better income as a beggar, and it started with their physical appearance.  Who looked more homeless?  Well they both looked equally bad, but the white guy was missing half of his right leg and the black guy had two good legs.  Then I thought about who needed it more.  The black guy might need more money to buy more food for the extra half a leg he had over 'ole whitey, but then again, maybe whitey needs more money for more nutrition since he exerts more energy trying to get somewhere. So then I thought about if people would think minority vs. disability at all.  

Clearly, I spent entirely way too much time thinking about this, being that it occupied the majority of my 45 minute commute home, especially since I wasn't actually having to choose.  At least it gave me something to do.  I really wanted to turn around and ask each of them to let me count the change in their cups.  I don't mean to be insensitive at all, it was just something that I really over-analyzed.