aul Canade sells more than 200, 9-ounce cups of coffee a night. He carries chips and bagels, buttered rolls, candy and other treats, but workers come for the hot caffeine. He keeps a small, propane-powered heater by the truck to stay warm.

Canade starts his 14-hour night in Staten Island at 8 p.m. He picks up his uncle's food truck and drives to the Fulton Street fish market for another night of stinky fish and hot coffee. This is only one of his two jobs. He works five hours selling from the food truck and then moves down the street to the Lockwood Fish Company at 2 a.m. Canade moves fish from the market to customers and shipping trucks until 9 a.m.

"Almost all the fish for New York City comes through here," he says, stacking five coffees for fish cutters Dewey Cioffi and Ken Hack. "It's always been that way. Restaurant guys come down here and they buy wholesale, directly from the market."

Canade is married and just bought a house in Staten Island, but he doesn't see his wife very much. She works from 9 in the morning to 9 at night at John Allen's haircutters on Wall Street. They spend their weekends together, but Canade says it's hard.

"We do what we can. I took the Bridge and Iron workers test a week ago," says Canade. "It was a hard mechanical aptitude and spacial relations exam, but I think I did OK. It's better pay, better hours and I need to keep working outside."