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That's the most I ever gave someone who randomly asked me for money.

My Achilles' heel is the street person with a dog or cat ...

There was one outside the HEB in old BDUs, just sitting there with a sign asking for help and an old dog laying beside him. I live near Killeen, Texas, right near Fort Hood, so he could have been a veteran ... or he could have just been someone who had acquired used BDUs.

I went into the store to do my shopping and, as I shopped, I reflected that, but for a couple of lucky breaks during my Army service, that could have been me. I was pretty upset by the time that I checked out.

As I left, I gave him a ten-dollar bill and 10 (I think it was) packages of hot dogs and some packs of cold cuts, figuring that those were food items for both him and the dog as well. He thanked me for the money and immediately opened one of the packs of hot dogs and started feeding them to his dog ...

I'm sorry, but I guess I'm an old softy now ... I had tears running down my cheeks by the time that I got to the car.

Never saw him and the dog again ...

Sometimes it's better to set aside the cynic within and go with the flow. Perhaps you are giving a guy money to feed a drug habbit but perhaps you are, in some cases like you mentioned, helping out someone who really needs a bit of charity to get through their day. When you walk away, you get to choose which scenario you want to believe, when I give a guy something I choose to believe it will be used for good purposes. Which is why I do it only with people where that scenario is plausible.

In the end, an act of charity benefits the recipient but it also benefits the giver. Always yielding to the cynic within robs you of that. So sometimes I tell him to shut up and I choose to give something.