Wednesday, May 25, 2005
Business Trip of Doom!
I felt so professional! My suits were packed my spiffy ionic blowdryer was packed, and I was ready to be Ms. Business Professional. I was selected to spend a week in Huntsville helping a sister branch of our company launch our program. Having had my vacation postponed about six times in the last six months, I was ready for a getaway. Here's the story....
The rental car was awesome, it was comfortable, had great gas mileage and also had sattelite radio. I had a travelling partner, former boss now peer Gary. The drive was great except that I missed Desperate Housewives (thankfully not the season finale). It was upon our arrival at the hotel that the horror started...
We enter the lobby past the door with the "Pardon Our Progress" sign, that's when I knew there was going to be trouble. We enter the lobby where the bored desk attendant is playing on the computer. She comes to the counter to check us in and then proceeds to ask us for our credit card for payment. My jaw drops and I am struck speechless. Gary fortunately is a seasoned traveller and manages to stutter out...."payment?"
We stare blankly at the woman for a span of minutes when Gary gets up the gumption to speak again.
Gary: Our company is paying for the hotel, it's direct billed.
Clerk: It doesn't say that here.
Gary: There's a mistake, let me call the travel office...(Gary goes to phone)
Myshe: (whines) They only gave us $300!
Gary gets a hold of the travel office who call the hotel to confirm. I hear the clerk telling the people who have Gary on hold that no payment arrangements were made. Gary pays more attention to the conversation. I'm trying to plan how we're both going to sleep in the rental car (which was paid for by the company) and no one think anything funny went on. I debate an all night drive back home, when Gary pulls out his credit card.
Gary: (cautiously) You won't charge anything to this card until I can get this taken care of in the morning?
Clerk: No, I'm just taking an impression to have on file in case you don't get it straightened out.
Gary: (nervously to Myshe) I can't afford two hotel rooms for a week.
Myshe: (whining) They only gave us $300!
We are given our keycards and instructed to go around to the back door to get to our rooms. We drive around back, pull out our bags and pop our newly issued keycards into the slot. The door resoundingly fails to open. We try this several times, getting more irritated by the minute. We go around to the side door and try it. We are met with the same lack of success. Gary goes back to the clerk and gets new keycards. Back door....nada. The side door works after a couple tries and we head on up to our rooms.
Unpacking, I decide to do what I had been waiting for throughout the planning stages of the trip and the drive up here....hit the hot tub. I needed a good stretch of the legs first so I navigated around the construction to the workout room and inserted my keycard. A pull on the door indicates that I'm not working out tonight. Defeated yet again, I go to the hot tub. It is not locked..yay! I turn the knob to start the whirlpool and read the notice that says to wait 2 minutes for the jets to start. Shrugging the notice off, I slide into the refreshingly hot water. I soak for a bit, keeping an eye on the clock for those two minutes and the magic jets of stress melting to start. After about 10 minutes of clock watching, I hear a noise. It's the sputter of one water jet starting. I slide to the happy jet and lean my back up against it to feel it's power. I push up a little closer to feel it and realize that my back is completely against both wall and jet and I still don't feel anything jetlike. I put my hand to the jet and feel a slight push of water.
After prodding at the one active jet for five minutes or so I hear another one start. I rush to that jet, ready for my lower back massage. Alas, it is not to be as this one is as bad as the other one. Defeated, yes....again. I return to my room and watch cartoons to make the pain go away.
The next day, I slip into my suit, ready to try again. Still no access to the workout room and an inner fear of losing my $300.00 to the desk clerk keeps me from asking what the deal is with the workout room. I settle on the hot tub when I am balked by a single sheet of paper hanging on the door. "Out of Order" Well damn, I could have told them that last night, but now, they can't even let me soak! Without jets!
It's as I slump back to my room, head down that I notice the source of all my hotel woes....there, in the design of the new carpet that is being laid throughout the hotel....uzumaki. That's when I knew this hotel was cursed.
The rental car was awesome, it was comfortable, had great gas mileage and also had sattelite radio. I had a travelling partner, former boss now peer Gary. The drive was great except that I missed Desperate Housewives (thankfully not the season finale). It was upon our arrival at the hotel that the horror started...
We enter the lobby past the door with the "Pardon Our Progress" sign, that's when I knew there was going to be trouble. We enter the lobby where the bored desk attendant is playing on the computer. She comes to the counter to check us in and then proceeds to ask us for our credit card for payment. My jaw drops and I am struck speechless. Gary fortunately is a seasoned traveller and manages to stutter out...."payment?"
We stare blankly at the woman for a span of minutes when Gary gets up the gumption to speak again.
Gary: Our company is paying for the hotel, it's direct billed.
Clerk: It doesn't say that here.
Gary: There's a mistake, let me call the travel office...(Gary goes to phone)
Myshe: (whines) They only gave us $300!
Gary gets a hold of the travel office who call the hotel to confirm. I hear the clerk telling the people who have Gary on hold that no payment arrangements were made. Gary pays more attention to the conversation. I'm trying to plan how we're both going to sleep in the rental car (which was paid for by the company) and no one think anything funny went on. I debate an all night drive back home, when Gary pulls out his credit card.
Gary: (cautiously) You won't charge anything to this card until I can get this taken care of in the morning?
Clerk: No, I'm just taking an impression to have on file in case you don't get it straightened out.
Gary: (nervously to Myshe) I can't afford two hotel rooms for a week.
Myshe: (whining) They only gave us $300!
We are given our keycards and instructed to go around to the back door to get to our rooms. We drive around back, pull out our bags and pop our newly issued keycards into the slot. The door resoundingly fails to open. We try this several times, getting more irritated by the minute. We go around to the side door and try it. We are met with the same lack of success. Gary goes back to the clerk and gets new keycards. Back door....nada. The side door works after a couple tries and we head on up to our rooms.
Unpacking, I decide to do what I had been waiting for throughout the planning stages of the trip and the drive up here....hit the hot tub. I needed a good stretch of the legs first so I navigated around the construction to the workout room and inserted my keycard. A pull on the door indicates that I'm not working out tonight. Defeated yet again, I go to the hot tub. It is not locked..yay! I turn the knob to start the whirlpool and read the notice that says to wait 2 minutes for the jets to start. Shrugging the notice off, I slide into the refreshingly hot water. I soak for a bit, keeping an eye on the clock for those two minutes and the magic jets of stress melting to start. After about 10 minutes of clock watching, I hear a noise. It's the sputter of one water jet starting. I slide to the happy jet and lean my back up against it to feel it's power. I push up a little closer to feel it and realize that my back is completely against both wall and jet and I still don't feel anything jetlike. I put my hand to the jet and feel a slight push of water.
After prodding at the one active jet for five minutes or so I hear another one start. I rush to that jet, ready for my lower back massage. Alas, it is not to be as this one is as bad as the other one. Defeated, yes....again. I return to my room and watch cartoons to make the pain go away.
The next day, I slip into my suit, ready to try again. Still no access to the workout room and an inner fear of losing my $300.00 to the desk clerk keeps me from asking what the deal is with the workout room. I settle on the hot tub when I am balked by a single sheet of paper hanging on the door. "Out of Order" Well damn, I could have told them that last night, but now, they can't even let me soak! Without jets!
It's as I slump back to my room, head down that I notice the source of all my hotel woes....there, in the design of the new carpet that is being laid throughout the hotel....uzumaki. That's when I knew this hotel was cursed.
Wednesday, May 11, 2005
Here is an update, now stop bugging me
Your Geek Profile: |
| Gamer Geekiness: Highest |
| SciFi Geekiness: Highest |
| Movie Geekiness: High |
| Academic Geekiness: Moderate |
| Music Geekiness: Moderate |
| Fashion Geekiness: Low |
| Geekiness in Love: Low |
| General Geekiness: Low |
| Internet Geekiness: Low |
