Sometimes I see a person walking down the sidewalk or loitering at the bus stop or something, and they'll have this particular look about them -- colored jeans, clashing stripes, kind of old-looking sweaters, slightly unkempt hair -- and I'll be faced with the ever-growing dilemma: hipster or homeless person?
There are a couple fool-proof ways to differentiate, but both require somewhat extensive time and effort. You either have to trail the person until you get a face-view (in which case, parties over 35 are usually homeless), or long enough to see if they arrive at A) a bike with copious quantities of plastic bags attached to the handle bars or B) a 1992 Volvo wagon. Either way, you're following around a dubious looking character for a possibly inconvenient length of time. In an attempt to find a shortcut in this situation, I've compiled some key points to bear in mind.
1) Both hipsters and hobos are often very fond of cheap beer. This rules out identifying them on the prestige of their malt beverage alone. The brands of the beer, however, are key in this situation: bums like Steel Reserve, while hipsters like PBR.
2) Hipsters and hobos share a love of ridiculously outdated bicycles; the difference between the two in this case lies in the color scheme. While hobos' bikes are likely to be entirely made of rust, hipsters' bikes are 100% likely to be painted a trendy yet antique-worthy color, like "vintage teal."
3) Hipsters are generally the younger of the two. Generally.
4) Hobos' plaid shirts, upon closer inspection, generally turn out to be a thicker, rougher flannel-y material than the lighter-weight fabrics of their counterparts'. (Hipsters' plaid shirts are usually made by any company with a bird logo [Hollister, American Eagle, etc].)
**BONUS TIP**
A caribeaner (also known as CLIPPY THINGS) instantly signifies a hipster. Spotting this will greatly shorten your inquisitive process and allow you to proceed to work/date/movie/whatever with minimal delay.
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