February 25, 2009
Eddie Pope: Paul Bunyan's African American Step Brother
I don't tell that many mission stories, because most people don't really care about how a dog once almost bit you and then you stepped into a puddle. However, I did meet an extraordinary person while living in Argentina, the account of which I feel would prove entertaining to some. HOW EXTRAORDINARY was this person you ask? Well, without going into hyperbole, Eddie Pope is the most outlandish character to walk the face of the earth since the likes of Pecos Bill, John Henry or Orville Redenbacher. I wouldn't be surprised if it was revealed someday that the pacific ocean was actually Eddie Pope's bathtub or that he used baseball bats as toothpicks and steel cables for dental floss.
Who is Eddie Pope?
Eddie Pope is a 6 ft 11 in, 350 pound black man from Mississippi who I met in Rio Gallegos, Argentina (Rio Gallegos is located at the very tip of South America). Eddie ended up in Argentina because he was a professional basketball player who was sent to prison ("prison" being a subjective term since he actually lived in a guarded house and we would routinely see him walking around town) because he accidentally killed his wife, an Argentinian beauty queen. How did he do this? By "accidentally" falling off a 5th story balcony and taking her with him. Eddie was in a coma for five months and when he woke up he found himself without a wife and convicted of manslaughter by the Argentina courts.
This is pretty much what Eddie looked like:
Now, this is the story that Eddie told us, but based on my dealings with Eddie, I have learned that about 50% of what he said was patently untrue, 20% was grossly exaggerated, and the rest was probably something he dreamed and mistook for reality. According to Eddie, he has lived a Forrest Gump-like life, traveling the world and taking part in every major cultural even of the past thirty years. Eddie was a nice guy (despite being a convicted killer) and we used to visit him at his prison-house weekly (if we didn't, he would call our apartment and beg us to bring him lunch meat and speed stick deodorant). As far as I can remember the most amazing/dubious Eddie Pope stories were:
1. Gambling Scandal/Howard Marshall
Eddie once told us that when he was playing basketball in college, a group of men (Eddie suspected it was mainly Donald Trump, but he wasn't sure) paid his team to fix a game, and then when the team didn't manage to lose Eddie had to flee to Europe with the help of a wealthy benefactor. Later, Eddie said that the person who helped him escape to Europe was Howard Marshall (the old guy that Anna Nicole Smith married for his money) and that one time he went to Marshall's ranch and was given a rifle and a 4 wheel drive vehicle and told that he could "drive around and shoot all the cows he wanted."
2. Europe Basketball/Illegitimate children
Eddie told us that once he was in Europe he played for twelve different teams in several countries, and that he would always seek out Mormon missionaries during his downtime because he knew they would probably be American and want to play basketball with him. He also casually mentioned that he had children in Italy, France, Germany, and Spain. Later he had Russian girlfriend who moved in with his mother in Mississippi along with their son, Elder (named of course in honor of all his missionary friends).
3. Jail Violence
Eddie told us horror stories of having to stab guys in the face to survive his first prison stay in Buenos Aires. Another time, we showed up at the jail and learned that we couldn't visit Eddie (or Eduardo, as the guards called him) because he was in "the hole" for a week. Eddie explained that he was attacked by several other inmates and ended up bashing someone's head in with a lead pipe.
4. Jon Huntsman Sr. Asks Eddie to Pull a Rambo
This is the most incredible of all the stories he told us, and I have to admit that I can't rule it out as completely false. Eddie said that before he went to jail in Argentina, he was contacted by "some rich Mormon dude with his own airplane" to see if he could rescue some kidnapped missionaries, and if he did he would be paid $5000. When I asked Eddie what the rich guy's name was he came up with Huntsman, but couldn't remember his first name. Anyways, Eddie found out where they were holding the missionaries and waltzed into a house filled with machine-gun-wielding kidnappers with nothing more than his winning personality. Eddie was somehow able to talk the men into letting the missionaries go by first telling them that it would be the right thing to do, and then offering to buy them all television sets. After Eddie got the missionaries out, he drove them to an airport where the "rich Mormon dude" met them in his private jet and took them back to the United States (and presumably paid Eddie $5000). Truly epic, and I'm kind of thinking about writing a screenplay based on this event (with the part of Eddie Pope played by Samuel L. Jackson).
Who is Eddie Pope?
Eddie Pope is a 6 ft 11 in, 350 pound black man from Mississippi who I met in Rio Gallegos, Argentina (Rio Gallegos is located at the very tip of South America). Eddie ended up in Argentina because he was a professional basketball player who was sent to prison ("prison" being a subjective term since he actually lived in a guarded house and we would routinely see him walking around town) because he accidentally killed his wife, an Argentinian beauty queen. How did he do this? By "accidentally" falling off a 5th story balcony and taking her with him. Eddie was in a coma for five months and when he woke up he found himself without a wife and convicted of manslaughter by the Argentina courts.
This is pretty much what Eddie looked like:
Now, this is the story that Eddie told us, but based on my dealings with Eddie, I have learned that about 50% of what he said was patently untrue, 20% was grossly exaggerated, and the rest was probably something he dreamed and mistook for reality. According to Eddie, he has lived a Forrest Gump-like life, traveling the world and taking part in every major cultural even of the past thirty years. Eddie was a nice guy (despite being a convicted killer) and we used to visit him at his prison-house weekly (if we didn't, he would call our apartment and beg us to bring him lunch meat and speed stick deodorant). As far as I can remember the most amazing/dubious Eddie Pope stories were:
1. Gambling Scandal/Howard Marshall
Eddie once told us that when he was playing basketball in college, a group of men (Eddie suspected it was mainly Donald Trump, but he wasn't sure) paid his team to fix a game, and then when the team didn't manage to lose Eddie had to flee to Europe with the help of a wealthy benefactor. Later, Eddie said that the person who helped him escape to Europe was Howard Marshall (the old guy that Anna Nicole Smith married for his money) and that one time he went to Marshall's ranch and was given a rifle and a 4 wheel drive vehicle and told that he could "drive around and shoot all the cows he wanted."
2. Europe Basketball/Illegitimate children
Eddie told us that once he was in Europe he played for twelve different teams in several countries, and that he would always seek out Mormon missionaries during his downtime because he knew they would probably be American and want to play basketball with him. He also casually mentioned that he had children in Italy, France, Germany, and Spain. Later he had Russian girlfriend who moved in with his mother in Mississippi along with their son, Elder (named of course in honor of all his missionary friends).
3. Jail Violence
Eddie told us horror stories of having to stab guys in the face to survive his first prison stay in Buenos Aires. Another time, we showed up at the jail and learned that we couldn't visit Eddie (or Eduardo, as the guards called him) because he was in "the hole" for a week. Eddie explained that he was attacked by several other inmates and ended up bashing someone's head in with a lead pipe.
4. Jon Huntsman Sr. Asks Eddie to Pull a Rambo
This is the most incredible of all the stories he told us, and I have to admit that I can't rule it out as completely false. Eddie said that before he went to jail in Argentina, he was contacted by "some rich Mormon dude with his own airplane" to see if he could rescue some kidnapped missionaries, and if he did he would be paid $5000. When I asked Eddie what the rich guy's name was he came up with Huntsman, but couldn't remember his first name. Anyways, Eddie found out where they were holding the missionaries and waltzed into a house filled with machine-gun-wielding kidnappers with nothing more than his winning personality. Eddie was somehow able to talk the men into letting the missionaries go by first telling them that it would be the right thing to do, and then offering to buy them all television sets. After Eddie got the missionaries out, he drove them to an airport where the "rich Mormon dude" met them in his private jet and took them back to the United States (and presumably paid Eddie $5000). Truly epic, and I'm kind of thinking about writing a screenplay based on this event (with the part of Eddie Pope played by Samuel L. Jackson).
Labels: the legend of Eddie Pope
February 12, 2009
A summary of my achievements
No one has ever accused me of being accomplished, but maybe it's because I've just been too modest about it. Well, no more. Here is a list of my achievements:
1. Coloring contest sponsored by "Oh Boy, Oberto!" Brand beef jerky.
Prize: T-shirt featuring the Oh Boy, Oberto! racing boat.
What did I do to deserve this?: I probably colored in the lines pretty good for a kid, I'm not really sure.
Year: 1992?
2. Book it! reading program sponsored by Pizza Hut.
Prize: Several coupons for free personal pan pizzas (I freaking OWNED the Book it! program when I was a kid). I remember going down to the Pizza Hut attached to the Kmart and getting my pizza, then going next door to the video rental store that inexplicably sold pogs and buying several of those. I was a rad 10-year-old.
What did I do to deserve this?: I read a large amount of books.
Year: 1994-1996?
3. Geography Bee Champion, Windridge Elementary School
Prize: A fanny pack with the National Geographic Society logo on it, a certificate of achievement and a 2 liter bottle of Sprite.
What did I do to deserve this?: I was able to correctly answer a bunch of geography questions, apparently. The question that won it all for me was correctly knowing about the existence of The Gaza Strip, either that or that France had recently tested a nuclear bomb.
Year: 1996
4. Farmington Jr. High's Track MVP Award.
Prize: A trophy with a golden runner guy on the top. (I wasn't even at the post season track team party when this award was announced because I had a paper route and I had to go straight home after school that day. This is still probably the greatest regret of my life.)
What did I do to deserve this?: Run, jump.
Year: 1998
Don't act like you're not impressed. All of these are featured prominently in my resume.
1. Coloring contest sponsored by "Oh Boy, Oberto!" Brand beef jerky.
Prize: T-shirt featuring the Oh Boy, Oberto! racing boat.
What did I do to deserve this?: I probably colored in the lines pretty good for a kid, I'm not really sure.
Year: 1992?
2. Book it! reading program sponsored by Pizza Hut.
Prize: Several coupons for free personal pan pizzas (I freaking OWNED the Book it! program when I was a kid). I remember going down to the Pizza Hut attached to the Kmart and getting my pizza, then going next door to the video rental store that inexplicably sold pogs and buying several of those. I was a rad 10-year-old.
What did I do to deserve this?: I read a large amount of books.
Year: 1994-1996?
3. Geography Bee Champion, Windridge Elementary School
Prize: A fanny pack with the National Geographic Society logo on it, a certificate of achievement and a 2 liter bottle of Sprite.
What did I do to deserve this?: I was able to correctly answer a bunch of geography questions, apparently. The question that won it all for me was correctly knowing about the existence of The Gaza Strip, either that or that France had recently tested a nuclear bomb.
Year: 1996
4. Farmington Jr. High's Track MVP Award.
Prize: A trophy with a golden runner guy on the top. (I wasn't even at the post season track team party when this award was announced because I had a paper route and I had to go straight home after school that day. This is still probably the greatest regret of my life.)
What did I do to deserve this?: Run, jump.
Year: 1998
Don't act like you're not impressed. All of these are featured prominently in my resume.
February 3, 2009
Areas of my life that could use a government bailout
1.My job: Due to recent layoffs, I have found myself with twice the amount of work to do in the same 30 hour per week period. This has caused me to become more invested in my job, and not necessarily in a good way. I mean, it's not like I love my job, but it has gotten me through college so far and I can generally count on it to be uneventful. With double the responsibility I now tend to worry about my "job performance" and whether or not I sent a coworker the appropriate "email." Suddenly, all those tacky "grumpy old lady" comics are not only starting to make sense to me, but I can totally relate to them. THAT CRAZY MAXINE!
2. My fitness level: This one reminds me of a t-shirt I saw once that said, "Someone should do something about how fat I'm getting." Get on it, government!
3. My car: Ever since this summer's breakdown, old Debbie hasn't seemed to be doing that well, and now I'm 87% sure that I need a new muffler. Either that or someone came during the night and replaced my engine with a much louder one.
4. That one ache I get in my shoulders sometimes: Pretty self explanatory.
2. My fitness level: This one reminds me of a t-shirt I saw once that said, "Someone should do something about how fat I'm getting." Get on it, government!
3. My car: Ever since this summer's breakdown, old Debbie hasn't seemed to be doing that well, and now I'm 87% sure that I need a new muffler. Either that or someone came during the night and replaced my engine with a much louder one.
4. That one ache I get in my shoulders sometimes: Pretty self explanatory.
Labels: brutal self evaluation
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