This is a Lemmy post of a screenshot of a Reddit post of a screenshot of a Reddit post of a screenshot of a Twitter tweet.

Truly an instance of xkcd’s Digital Data comic. https://xkcd.com/1683/

This one is sad because she was obviously mentally ill and not getting the help she needed, but it’s the best example I have of the city I grew up in.

We had “Toonie Lady.” She would roam around downtown begging for a Toonie and would get very upset if you gave her anything else, even if it was more.

For the non-Canadians, a Toonie is a $2 coin.

There is a man that wears chainmail armor made out of soda can pop tabs that is famous in both Tucson and Phoenix areas of Arizona. His name is Chicago, and you can catch him on the bus or at random punk and metal shows around AZ, if you are lucky.

Kitten Guy.

Dude was a little strange, but otherwise a good person. He just kept taking in strays, and if he had kittens in need, they went everywhere with him. Most of them ended up at new homes, but he had a few who stuck around. Wasn’t unusual for him to be feeding two or three kittens and have two more sitting on his shoulders.

It was an extremely small town, so he stuck out like a sore thumb. They went everywhere with him. Never caused any trouble.

My hometown’s got the yellow man. Some random dude who’s wearing nothing but yellow clothes, riding a yellow bicycle around the place. I wonder what his favourite colour might be…

Ass-man of Szeged, in Hungarian ‘Szegedi Picsaember’. He wears very-very tight jean shorts. Even during winter.

Here is an article about him: https://444.hu/2013/05/03/holgyeink-es-uraink-a-szegedi-picsaember

I lived in a small town and there was a guy who’d ride his bike everywhere, with big metal panniers usually filled with soda cans. He’d be out in all weather, with high-visibility gear on, and would travel all miles outside of town with hundreds of cans piled on his bike.

When I asked people about him, they said he had a learning disability and lived with his mom, and would sell the soda cans for a little spending cash. Everybody loved him, especially the town government who paid him a stipend to clean up the town and let him keep anything he found. Since I helped at the local farmer’s market I met him quite a few times and he was always cheerful and friendly.

Crackhead Dan.

He started out as “dancing Dan” because of how often you could see him jamming out to something walking down the road, but he didn’t like the name. Somehow it changed to crackhead, and I haven’t heard his opinion on it.

He looks rather disheveled, leading many to wonder if he’s homeless or not. Nobody seems to know. I’ve never seen him panhandling, dumpster diving, or with anything other than a backpack.

He likes to support the city’s high school band though, goes to the football games and always goes to the band concession stand and leaves tips.

You could tell anyone any story about him and they’d just go “yeah that sounds about right”

Pallet guy. Very few know his face, but we all know his tiny car and stack of 10 pallets on top speeding down the interstate.

Manchester has Boom Box Barry.

You’ll see him riding around and people smile and wave at him. He is, as we say up here, a sound lad (no pun intended).

St Louis has “keytar guy”. He sets up at random intersections in the city and jams out on his keyboard. He’s usually sporting a mullet and is shirtless with cutoff jean shorts. He’s pretty good and is entertaining as hell.

Poop-man here in Gothenburg, Sweden.

A dude that has been banned from all music festivals in Sweden and many others in neighbouring countries because he covers himself with shit and bathes in urinals. He has also smeared shit all over the walls in multiple places, including one of the ferries here. I worked at an underground club for a few years around 2005 and he “painted” the walls of one of our toilets one time. He never drinks or does drugs apparently, he’s just fucked up. Been well-known since the 90s…

Albuquerque had little shorts guy. Walked around Central Ave near the university wearing naught but a tiny, tiny pair of shorts or thong and usually carrying an anti-war/pro-gay sign. Pretty fun fellow to talk to, but was too into drinking urine imho.

Austin used to have Leslie. He was frequently seen riding around Town Lake on his bike, sporting naught but his hot pants or brightly colored thong. RIP

We had the phone guy. He used to walk around town with a red plastic rotary phone, and occasionally tell passersby they had a call.

Then cellphones happened, and he just sort of… vanished.

It’s been a long time now, of course, but sometimes I still think of him and worry what it must have been like, being sort of outcompeted off his little self assigned ecological niche of sorts what must have felt like overnight. One day you’re the phone guy, next day everyone’s walking around with a phone on their ear, and you’re stuck with your old unplugged red rotary phone. Tragic.