# Kick Downs



## Jordi Napalm (Jan 5, 2009)

A saw a thread on hear about interesting trains, and i wondered to myself if anyone has ever gotten any interesting kick downs... so i decided to wonder out loud, and now i'm asking!


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## IBRRHOBO (Jan 5, 2009)

weirdest kick down (due to the situation) i ever got was a c-note and a ride to kc from a bull in lawrence, ks after a cop called in seeing me on the porch of a grainer. he ran my id and loaded me up and drove me to the 7th street yard in ks (armordale).


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## Jordi Napalm (Jan 5, 2009)

a c-note, as in, a hundred bucks?


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## Bendixontherails (Jan 5, 2009)

I think a c note's gotta be up there on the list. 


I guess the best I ever had was a ride from Toronto to Baltimore who kicked me down an '86 chevy astro van. sold it for $1600!!! that money got me a fuckin season pass to greyhound.


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## marc (Jan 5, 2009)

i got a 380 dollar kickdown from some old lady when i was hitching the 101 to frisco. and i also got a 100 dollar kickdown from some lady when i was in naples,fl riding in a van to miami. ive also had countless weed and beer kickdowns.


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## desaparecido (Jan 5, 2009)

oddest kickdown for me was a handful of change and then a fat joint of chronic from a blonde with a nice car. kind of confusing


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## marc (Jan 5, 2009)

i was in frisco on haight st. and me and a few people were playing music and yelling and spanging really obnoxiously and some lady came up to us and set down a piggy bank and said here now shut the fuck up and walked away. it ended up being like 40 dollars in change. we got drunk as fuck that night


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## IBRRHOBO (Jan 5, 2009)

Jordi Napalm said:


> a c-note, as in, a hundred bucks?



yup, a) i've only received two c-notes in my life; and b) it was from the bull.


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## Jordi Napalm (Jan 5, 2009)

oh yeah, it definatly is impressive, i just wasn't sure what the word meant!


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## spud (Jan 5, 2009)

i like how the bull took you to another yard


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## jokey_bogus (Jan 6, 2009)

me and a friend were hitching to Ga and on the way sitting on the sidewalk in front of a walmart, we got kick down 65 $ and a case of beer. and a pizza delivered to the sidewalk. all during about 3 hrs after we had just crawled out from the bushes in the morning. milidgeville GA, or something like that about 150 miles from jacksonville FL


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## simpletoremember (Jan 7, 2009)

countless weed kicked down hitching the 101. i've gotten my fair share of the $100 kickdowns too, but the most odd kick down i was busking in missoula, montana and this girl i had conflicts with the prior night mased me, and tossed the rest of the can in my guitar case.


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## condemnedtodrift (Jan 7, 2009)

A lady approaches me in Charleston, SC, and says that she's been saving some christmas money, but she'd like to give it to me. She slaps a hundo in my hand and gives me a big hug (I was covered from head to toe in a friends vomit from the night before). During all of this, my friend is in the Earth Fare getting $50 worth of groceries and another $20 from another chick that kept asking us if we were crazy and going to kill her. The woman that kicked down the c-note comes back 20 mins later, and says her kids wanted to donate their school snacks for the next 2 weeks and two of their baby blankets.

I was staying at an infoshop in town and ended up buying coffee, cigs, and booze for everyone there. I was broke two days later, but we all had a fucking blast! I usually give away the excess cash I make to homebums and other traveling kids.


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## katiehabits (Jan 8, 2009)

i think the most interesting kick-down i ever got was while flying a sign in one of the suburbs of ottawa with a friend of mine & our friend's dog.
a little background info on this story: traveling with my friends band bass player get's appendices ends up in hospital then two members of said band take off to montreal leaveing one original member of tour with the van & then two random friends and me no money no tour & we need to get back to vancouver......
this women saw the dog on the meridian with us & started crying & gave us $20. that was the biggest drop we had gotten all day..... then she comes back like half a hour later & we've made like $8 more dollars or something stupid like that & hands us two cloth grocery bags with this inside- a bottle of red wine, like 5 cans of fancy wet dog food, a bag of dog food, some tuna, sardines, a few cans of cola, two cans of V8, some chocolate bars, granola bars, two water proof cloth dog bowls, some sort of rope toy, granola bars & $20 MORE.
turns out her dog had just died & looked exactly like my friend's dog. she didn't stop crying the whole time....


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## NickCofphee (Jan 10, 2009)

That's awesome! I think the personal kickdowns like that are always better. As opposed to someone just dropping money your way, barely acknowledging you otherwise.

I've gotten a greyhound ticket bought and a very nice amtrak ticket through the Denver-Sacramento route. I felt my heart tug at seeing freights pass by though. That same guy gave me $100 too. And coffee, breakfast.

$100 another time panhandling.

Hitching on the 4th of July, a shitty day on the 101 south of San Fran. A cop decided to park at the end of the onramp and do speedtraps. I sat there for over an hour in the sun with my head down. A very nice local woman came by, heard my story, then went home to make me a vegan sandwich straight from her garden! It made my day so much.

Been invited back, me and the big group of smelly punks, to houses TWO nights in a row in Berkeley panhandling on Telegraph. That was cool.

Motel once when hitching through Idaho with a friend. Houses invited back to several times. (like last night with the sweet elderly couple in New Zealand!)


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## dVEC (Jan 17, 2009)

Walked to the ramp outside Jacksonville with two other guys and got a ride before even sitting down...

It was a woman and her two sons aged about 3 and 6, and everything they owned filling the whole car. I had to ride shotgun with the six year-old between my knees.

When she dropped us off, she put a string of rosary beads in my hand.


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## Shoestring (Jan 17, 2009)

_*Right on! I once got a kick-down from a bull in Little Ferry, New Jersey. I rode in on a hot-shot from Selkirk to NJ and he saw me underneath a trailer and got me out and drove me to a restaurant then gave me a $50.00 spot! (I had my DD-214 on me then), and this always has kelped me out with kick-downs!
Also several engineers have given me money. The most ever was from one in the Strawberry Yards. He actually whadded up two $20.00 and threw them from the jeep down to me as I was almost off property.
The yard-workers in Conway Yards have been known to kick-down to me too. I even had one worker give me two cans of beer he had saved back for his lunch in his lunch-pail! Ha ha!*_


IBRRHOBO said:


> weirdest kick down (due to the situation) i ever got was a c-note and a ride to kc from a bull in lawrence, ks after a cop called in seeing me on the porch of a grainer. he ran my id and loaded me up and drove me to the 7th street yard in ks (armordale).


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## Kobet Pahana (Jan 17, 2009)

me and my girlfriend were sittin under the toronto ebd, some woman came by, asked us if we were gonna ride. when she saw are expresions she said it's all right you can tell me. she got really excited, said she always wanted to meet riders, went back to her home in the suburbs brought us blueberries and $20


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## dVEC (Jan 19, 2009)

I got a blueberry kickdown in Maine once... sooooooo goooooooood.


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## Jordi Napalm (Jan 23, 2009)

best kickdown i've ever gotten was, uh... two days ago.
i was bumming for change on the sidewalk, and a young looking girl (my age?) came up, and asked me if i needed an clothes. So, she brought me:
A Studded Denim Vest
A Mischief Brew t-shirt
A Fleas and Lice backpatch
A little bag of studs
A Zipup hoodie
A Handful of band buttons
and an Against Me! patch

best.


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## Ravie (Jan 23, 2009)

thats pretty kick ass. it was probably her ex boyfriends stuff haha

the best i got was i was playing guitar out side an albertsons wth my dog and some old guy came up and i asked for a cigarette. we talked for a minute and e said he'd be right back. he came back with a bag of expesive dog food, new pack of smokes, food, and $30....i was stoked.


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## Dameon (Jan 23, 2009)

A guy who saw me playing music at the Pike Place Market in Seattle liked me and my music so much he bought me a new pennywhistle. A $170 pennywhistle.

And then there was the time a bunch of us were hanging out at the rainbow wall on Haight street on Halloween, and somebody came by and left a paper grocery bag for us. When we looked in, expecting food or something, it turned out to be half full of pot. Everybody took a big handful and split up.


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## Labea (Jan 23, 2009)

two grams of coke and a razor


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## Umbraperagro (Jan 23, 2009)

Can of sardines, five bucks in change, a gingerale, new case of water in the fridge and a fresh tank of fuel for the unit I was riding.
Another time some guy came up to me while busking, and pulled out two beers that were stuffed in the front of his bike pants. Then walked away without a word...


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## dime (Jan 23, 2009)

i got a psp kickdown in asheville


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## Ravie (Jan 23, 2009)

ooooh...nice.


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## freepizzaforlife (Jan 25, 2009)

I have two regarding weed, and one regarding money.

I was in santa cruz at this free lunch thing with my buddy squirrel. we were sitting there eating, and noticed this older guy had dropped some of his weed. I walk over and told him he dropped his herb, he smiled, put it in his bag and said thanks, 5 minutes later he dropped more of his weed, I walk over again, and go, hey man you dropped some more of your herb. he looks down, picks it up, puts it in his bag, hands it to me and goes "you look like you need it more then me"

these next two occurred in iowa City.

My buddy Trash and I were flying a sign that said "we need money for weed" this guy walks by, gives us a pair of pink chuck taylors, and a bag of weed. it was like one of those what the fuck sort of deals.

and

Trash and I were in iowa City spanging and playing music on a friday night (for the record, best town ive experienced for spanging on weekend nights, we made like 200 bucks in this particular weekend), anyways trash was playing ukulele, and i was tapping my hands on this clementine crate, and we were flying this sign that says "well play a song about you or anything for money, which worked extremely well) this college dude and his drunk girlfriend come up, the girl goes, is that a violin? and at the same time we both said no. and kept asking us to play the vavaldi. our friend ben was sitting there just like what the fuck, so this shit goes on for about 45 minutes, we and this guy hands us a 20, and goes "im only giving this to you because she can rock a violin", she turns around, and he whispers to us "its not because she can rock a violin", by now its about 3:30 in the morning. and trash and I decide to leave, they are still talking to ben. come to find out from talking to ben the next day. they gave him a 20 dollar bill too.


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## freepizzaforlife (Jan 25, 2009)

so fucking good.


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## Ravie (Jan 25, 2009)

oh one time i got a whole ounce of weed throne at me. that ws cool. i rolled it up to sell it by the joint...then ended up selling 3 and smoked the rest haha


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## hkbenj (Jan 26, 2009)

got kicked down a heaping handful of peyote, in portland oregon.


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## bote (Jan 26, 2009)

a guy gave me a mountain hardware sleeping bag outside Ashland, he said I looked like I needed it. He was absolutely right, I slept so good in the ditch right where he dropped me off.


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## Uncle Stinky (Jan 26, 2009)

I had a guy give me a big block of hash and $35 bucks in 1980-- _really_ nice kickdown back then.


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## Raging Bird (Jan 26, 2009)

O brother where art thou!!!!!


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## jabbyscabby (Jan 31, 2009)

*Lucky friend (jelousy)*

My friends cakes the other day had flown a sign by a grocery store. It said need money for new clothes. A lady picked him up and drove him to a work wear store where he got isolated Carhartt bibs, Carhartt jacket, and Boots. The lady spent around 300$$$ OMG....I wish i could of been him!! 

Any cool kick down stories?


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## Ravie (Jan 31, 2009)

*Lucky friend (jelousy)*

i think we already have a kick down thread.


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## finn (Feb 1, 2009)

*Lucky friend (jelousy)*



Ravie said:


> i think we already have a kick down thread.



Merged and done!

Man, the best kickdown I got was a polarfleece bed roll in nola... better than nothing!


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## mylon (Feb 26, 2009)

i've gotten a hundo and a few 50's before but the most interesting one ive ever gotten was a brand new digital video camera, got it last week from this girl on a bus in portland. she asked me & my girlfriend if we rode trains and then she offered us a camera to record our trips with. apparently she got it for free from her bank when she signed up & she was a stripper so she was pretty ballin'. the camera's actually pretty decent too.


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