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[sikora]

I second the church thing.  My brother is a pastor, and I've seen him deal with this sort of thing fairly regularly.  Sometimes he can do something for a caller out of his own volition, and in some cases he has to call the church deacons who control the funds.  He once got a call from a guy at a truck stop. The guy had been working temp for a private moving company, and the crew abandoned him at a truck stop far away from home, and he hadn't been paid, of course (not an uncommon occurrence).   My brother called the truck stop to make sure this guy was really there.  Then he went out there, with some church cash, bought the guy a meal and a bus ticket home.  In fact, he ate a late night breakfast with the guy, giving him an ear and company as well.

The church also has a small collection of gift cards from local grocery chains that my brother can give out. I think they are about $50.  He does have to call the church deacons to okay it, but they usually do.  He once got a call from a guy with three kids, no food, and no gas to get to work.  The church gave him one of the gift cards, and my brother bought him 5 gallons of gas. 


The church also tries to keep meals made by congregation members in the church freezer, for those who knock on the door and ask for food.  It's a simple matter of taking the guest to the kitchen and microwaving a frozen casserole. 

So it's worth asking around church pastors for a meal or help with food.  I think the gift cards from grocery stores are pretty popular because cash can be spent for things other than food.

[madhatter]

Ah, the glamorous life of a college teacher! Sell your plasma, dumpster-dive, dodge your landlord...

[tolerantly]

t_f's idea about medical studies might be a good one. My mom is a recruiter for medical research-most of the studies are not at all scary and quite low-risk. If I lived closer to her, there are actually a few I would sign up for. Well worth the $$.

Medical studies are almost never a good idea. They involve taking something unproven into your body, and the hospital has no liability if it harms you. The $200 you'll make -- not in time to eat this week, btw -- might get you through the first doctor visit in many years' worth of visits for a chronic condition sparked or aggravated by Mystery Substance or Novel Surgical Technique.

I've been very, very poor, but always steered clear of med studies.

OP, talk to the landlord. Most landlords would much rather suck up a late rent or two than lose an otherwise good tenant, and no landlord wants to evict.

[prephd]

Do you have things to sell? Hubby and I once emptied out our DVD / video game / electronics collection to a pawn shop. We didn't get nearly what we'd get on EBay or some other place, but it was quick cash when we needed it.

[peppergal]

If you feel weird about asking for handouts (which you shouldn't, but I know it's human nature to do so), you could volunteer at a soup kitchen or shelter.  They often feed their volunteers.  I did that for a while when a bank error froze my account for two weeks, and I had no way to pay for food (they had me confused with someone who wasn't paying child support, and froze the wrong account).

[cranefly]

I survived for months off my music collection (CDs mostly). I had a lot, but you'd be surprised what you can get for some rare CDs.
You can probably scrounge enough for a bag of rice and oatmeal. It's not gourmet, but it will keep you full on the cheap for a short period of time.
It's a great time to take advance season contracts for snow removal. I just paid a FORTUNE for an advance contract ($500), and it looks like we might get a warm winter.
Sell everything you can--CD players, TVs, etc. You can play these things through your computer.
It's mid-term and students are scrambling--offer to help edit (not write!) their term papers via signs on campus.
There's lots of great ideas above. You can do it if you can learn to be resourceful. Trust me, I lived for 2 years on practically no income as an adjunct.

[tenured_feminist]

Tolerantly, it depends on the study. I wasn't ever able to get into any of the really lucrative ones (didn't have the right pre-existing conditions), but I did make a lot of my book bills and incidentals during undergrad and grad school with completely non-invasive, boring psych studies. And Mr.T_F hit the jackpot once with a study on acid reflux -- if I remember right, they were testing an off-label use of a run-of-the-mill drug, but he got something like $700 because they were scoping the subjects. The $$ was largely to induce people to undergo the discomfort of the scoping; there was no significant danger involved. Probably the highest hourly wage either of us has ever earned or ever will earn. And he got the $$ right away.

Depending on where you are, OP, there's probably some money to be made by going around offering to clean the leaves out of people's gutters if you're not afraid of heights. Everyone knows it should be done, but it's hard for dual-career families to find the time now that daylight savings has ended. If someone knocked on my door and promised to do a decent job tomorrow, I'd probably fork over $50 without blinking.

For the longer term, you could look into grading AP/SAT/GRE exams. The money's pretty decent from what I hear and it's an easy add-on.

[musicagloria]

This may or may not help right now, but you should check out http://www.angelfoodministries.com/ and see whether they have a sponsoring church in the area where you live. They sell groceries at a much lower rate than stores, and most churches will have some extra shares that they could give out in return for a couple hours of volunteer service.

[alleyoxenfree]

As a short term solution, I suggest crashing events with foods.  Seriously.  Most campuses have several each week.  If anyone asks, tell them you're writing an article related to the academic area.  And on Sunday, go to a church that serves coffee and donuts at least.  You can meet a pastor there.

Also, you might get quick money for clothes at a consignment store that buys things outright.

For the slightly longer term, you need more income that comes with a food bonus.  Look for a part-time job at a grocery store or deli, a restaurant, catering company, or bakery.  I know of several students who fed themselves well on leftovers.  Every restaurant has untouched food that can't be kept, something made with the wrong sauce, more salad than got ordered that night.  In other words, get a job where you can get some decent food before it goes in the dumpster.  If you work at a market, you can often get all your groceries at a big employee discount.  If you work in catering, you often get to eat the wedding food that's left over.

[alleyoxenfree]

And if you're my colleague one cubicle over, email me.  I have way too many apples and other stuff.

[alleyoxenfree]

Another thought, many departments have a lunchroom where excess food from department events is stored.  No one is going to know or care if you go in there and take a juice, an applesauce, some chips, or whatever else is there.  This should tide you over until you get another plan in place.

[ucprof]

Cleaning houses is a great idea.  My first "housekeeper" was a humanities PhD student.  It worked out well for both of us - I've hired other students as well.  I suggest to find a netnews group for your university and post an advertisement saying that you are an adjunct prof in dire need of additional income and that you will clean houses, spring cleaning, mow lawns etc for pay.  Also post an ad for a tutor.  If you can tutor math you can make significant money at the gradeschool/high school level.  At my university (which granted is an R1) the very technical PhD students significanly supplement their incoming tutoring rich kids in math.  I don't know what part of the country you are in but people may need help raking leaves (this time of year) or other odd jobs around the house.  See what you can get.  If you like dogs, then offer to dog walk.  Offer to house sit in lieu of your rooming house. 
Also pardon my abruptness, but what the _ are you doing as an underpaid adjunct at 50+???  Do you have a PhD?  Isn't it time to find some regular job with a decent salary?  Or get some retraining so you can get such a job??

[alleyoxenfree]

If Craigslist is active in your community, tutoring jobs are often posted there.

Check out http://www.freecycle.org.

Volunteer at a community garden - help someone get their garden tidied for winter in exchange for the last of the produce.  Post a flyer there offering this service.

On edit: Ucprof, I'm not sure what state you are in, but many of the CSU's rely on longtime lecturers who are, effectively adjunct, on short-term contracts.  The same for Arizona.  The same for half-a-dozen other states I can think of.  These are people who formerly had longer term contracts with the universities, but whose work has been cut and cut.  So it used to be a good longterm gig but is now - just prior to their retirement - dicey.  Half my colleagues are in this predicament.  In addition, there are tons of reasons having nothing to do with someone's teaching or scholarship why someone might adjunct between better gigs, as has been well-discussed on the fora, from family issues to illness to budget cuts.  But your point is well-taken - this is a wakeup call that hu needs a better gig and deserves a more secure next 20 years of work. 

[catmom]

I wonder if there is a food store, bakery etc who would let you have "old" stuff, like fruit that's turning bad on one end, bread from yesterday, stuff that's about to expire but probably still good. Maybe you can strike some kind of deal that you "volunteer" your services to move boxes or whatever in return if it makes them or you feel better.

[neil9]

Not being unsympathetic. But if adjuncting leads to this mess, isn't time to consider another line of work, like teaching middle school?