More strange experiences, this time less corporate.

You’re a Hard Man to Find

When I was in undergrad, my brother or neighbor called me from the city where my parents lived in another state. They said that the police were looking for me. Not really the phone call I wanted to get.

I called the number that they. It turns out it was the police local to me who wanted to get ahold of me. The somehow looked up me up via my parents. Umm…

I called the number and a detective answers. He asked me if when I last saw my car and what state it was in. I told him I saw it that morning when I left my place and biked to class. Wrong answer. Apparently, I fabricated that memory.

In the middle of the night the wheels on my car had been stolen. A neighbor had seen another truck in the parking lot and a bunch of wheels in the bed. My truck was left on the ground. They grabbed the plate number and reported it to the police. Local SWAT suited up and enjoyed some nice practice breaking down their door and recovering the wheels. The detective told me that they had had fun getting them back.

I could head downtown now and recover the wheels from evidence. Problem was that I didn’t have a car to get them. What was I going to do, roll them home one at a time? No luck on getting an assist from the department bringing them to me. Luckily a friend helped me out.

The detective though mentioned to me that I had been hard to track down. I didn’t have a presence on social media and had removed my contact info and name from the university’s public directory.

You’re a hard man to find, Mr. Barbara. Please don’t ever become a fugitive of the law.

Mexico Bus Robbery

In high school, I did a multi-week summer langauge immersion in Mexico. Every day I’d take the bus to the language school from my host house. Let’s call it the #2 route. Usually we’d take another bus back.

One day late in the evening another student and friend of mine who was staying in the same host house wasn’t feeling too great. We were ready to head home for the evening. The #2 bus going the opposite direction was pulling up, and we were impatient. Brilliant idea, we’ll just take that. It probably takes the same route in reverse. Clearly, I didn’t understand bus routes.

We got on and rode for a bit. It kept going and going and going. Soon nothing was recognizable. It was getting dark. More and more passengers were exiting the bus and it didn’t seem to be heading at all in the direction we needed.

Finally we were down to just 7 or so people on the bus including the driver. Two men got up from their spots. One went to the front and the other toward the back where the remaining passengers were located. After hassling the riders in front of us, he approached us with his hand in the pocket of his jacket and what looked like a solid object pointed toward us.

Give me all your money.

My friend generously replied.

I don’t have anything, he’s got it all. (pointing to me)

That was the most fluent and fastest Spanish I’d ever heard him utter. This was also a lie. It was nearly the opposite. I had lost my wallet on the trip and only had Mex$110 ($11 at the time) left: a 100 peso bill and a 10 peso one. My friend on the other hand had a wallet full of USD, cards, etc.

I reached into my pocket and grabbed one of the bills, hoping it was the 10 peso note. Bad luck.

After handing him the bill, he was quite unsatisfied and started patting my cargo shorts. Yes, it was the 2000’s. I figured it would be bad to hedge at this point and give up the other bill, so I offered him the laundry detergent I had purchased earlier that day. He was clearly disappointed and went away.

Up front I could see the other guy clearing out the driver’s change sorter into a bag. He motioned for the driver to pull over. Before they stepped off, he ripped the stereo receiver out of the bus and said something in Spanish about the driver’s mom.

At that point we hoped it was the end and we’d now get to return home safely. The driver instead went a few blocks down, pulled over, and told the rest of us to get off. So much for solidarity.

We slinked through the shadows, two gringos running between street lights until we found an open cantina that would let us use their phone to call a cab. It took 2 or 3 bars until we found one. Then we had to convince them to take USD, which was less difficult than I imagined. Finally, we made it back to our host house and collapsed on the entry steps tired from the subsiding adrenaline.

We didn’t mention it to our host parents, but told our US teacher in the morning about the incident. Phone calls to parents promptly ensued.

Bora Bora

I was part of an acquisition in quaint, humble Ann Arbor. As Midwestern as fresh-pressed apple cider. The CEO of the acquiring company eventually dropped in, and we carved out an hour to hear as we squeezed into our 20-person conference room.

An HR administrator had to fly in special from California just for this visit to prepare for him. I don’t know all what she had to do. I do remember a very special component was ensuring that the CEO had Diet Pepsi Cola Wild Cherry chilled in the fridge for him in case he got thirsty. It was even labeled with his name and with orders for us not to drink it. Apparently the Diet Pepsi Cola Wild Cherry was a key to his success.

The CEO was dripping in his suit and watch that cost more to buy than I made in a year at the time (I looked it up).

I’m really tired. I’m just stopping in on my way back from Bora Bora from our top sellers event. Who here’s been to Bora Bora? Raise your hand!

One person raised theirs. Some people I could see pulling out their phones to look up Bora Bora. I wasn’t too familiar with my French Polynesian islands either to be honest.

It was a real Mitt Romney moment. Like when he made a bet for $10K in a national debate like it was nothing.

Anyways, in a 1:1 session with the former CEO of the acquired company, apparently some advice was dispensed about a difficult employee. The big shot’s advice?

It’s the a*$holes who get things done.

Ah, two keys to apparent success. That and a cold Diet Pepsi Cola Wild Cherry.