Thursday, May 06, 2004

"Questions for the Game of Life and Love"

“If is the ultimate book about fantasy. Each of its questions is meant to spark and tantalize the imagination. They are a celebration of the human spirit, which loves to dream and needs to hope, but which can also fear and even grow angry.”

 

The next randomly selected question is:

 

If you had to identify the worst hotel room you have ever stayed in, where was it?

 

It's a tie for me. But, it's no wonder. I'm so cheap that when it comes to footing the bill for a hotel room, I will more than likely opt for a "Motel-Six" type place over some of the nicer places that I've stayed at like The Anatole in Dallas or the La Quinta Resort in Palm Springs.

 

When I was in the Army and stationed at Fort Sam Houston for AIT, a group of us went downtown and rented several rooms at a dive hotel just around the corner from the Alamo.  We liked to hang-out downtown and party whenever we were granted a weekend pass. No one wanted to return to the base.  It was our time to feel like human beings again.  Being newly enlisted, none of us made all that much money.  As such, we didn’t really care about the amenities. The hotel was just a place to crash off base. I don’t remember much about that weekend, mostly because I have such a poor memory but also because on the first night I got trashed and crashed on the first bed I came to after having spewed shrimp with cocktail sauce all over the bathroom. 

 

I came back from that weekend with a tattoo on my shoulder. The guy who crashed in the other bed in the room came back with crabs. He didn’t sleep with one of the local hookers and he sure as hell didn’t sleep with me, because he had his girlfriend with him. The best we could figure is that he got it from his mattress. But, I think my shenanigans may have been sufficient payback.

 

----or------

 

My second year in Los Angeles, I made the huge mistake of deciding to drive to Prescott, Arizona for the Thanksgiving holiday. It was the first time that I attempted to leave the Los Angeles area via car for a holiday weekend. I hit the road at about 4pm that Wednesday and I think every other person in L.A. did the same thing. What should have been a 5 or 6 hour drive, ended up taking me that long just to get to the California/Arizona border. At about 10pm, I stopped on the California side to buy gas. I was talking to the clerk and telling him how long I had been driving and that I still had a couple of hours ahead of me. I was telling him that I was so tired that I didn't thinkI could make it. He told me to pull around back and crash in the car. I asked him if it was a safe area. He said it was okay but if I'd like he'd keep an eye on my car. I thought about it for all of two seconds and said an emphatic Hell No! But, I did decide I should pull off for the night and get a room. I asked him where I could find a cheap hotel nearby. He directed me up the street.

 

It was what most would call a motor-inn. It's the kind you pull up to the front of your room. It must have been a hot-spot for truckers because there were several big-rigs in the lot. I requested an upstairs room. If I have to be alone, I always feel safer on the second floor of where ever I stay.  I figure that it's harder to break into a second story window. 

 

I was lucky. I think? There was a room available. However, the walkway ran the length of the building so the floor to ceiling windows were just as easily accessible to some transient molester who might notice that I was entering my room alone then if I ended up in a first floor room. The door lock was just one of those simple knob types, no double-bolt padlock for me. And, those wimpy chains don't mean much to a drugged up psycho trying to bust in.  As such, I put a chair in front of the door and moved my nightstand in front of the window. Housekeeping, if there was such a thing for that place, left much to be desired. There was a layer of dust, more like dirt, on everything. Remembering the early experience in San Antonio, I was afraid to sleep on the bed. But, the lack of housekeeping made me even more leery to sleep on the floor. So, I opted for sleeping on a corner of the bed fully clothed with just a corner of the bedspread flipped over me. When I woke in the morning, I didn't even take a shower, the room just gave me the jeebies. I brushed my teeth and got the hell out of there.  But, I did make it through the night, albeit a very restless one at that, because every time someone walked outside my room I woke up. Needless to say, I wait until the next morning now before leaving town on a holiday weekend. I'd rather wake at the crack of dawn then go through that mess again.

19 comments:

Anonymous said...

Glen Lodge, Watkins Glen, NY, one of the 'cabins.' They were described as 'rustic,' and they were if 'rustic' means 'icky.' I am not terribly picky about these things, but I don't want to feel like I might get worms from standing in the shower. A very closer runner-up was a Holiday Inn in a fairly nasty part of downtown Atlanta. It suffered from the same Icky Shower Syndrome, and furthermore had no hot water. They did bring me a new shower curtain when I complained that there was more mold than curtain on the one originally in the room.

Anonymous said...

What comes to mind is a motel my husband and I stayed at during a business trip to Seattle.  We had been shocked that we couldn't find a cheaper motel anywhere close in to the city...in fact, there were not a lot of motels available, period.  The motel seemed okay, and the room seemed clean...but then we found a used condom under the bed, and a hypodermic needle stashed on the moulding above the door.  Bleah!!!  Lisa  :-]

Anonymous said...

What immediately I saw in my minds eye was my stay at what I affectionaly refer to now as "The Bates Motel"...I was stuck in a room at the very back of the motel, and there were no other customers.  A curtain was the door to the bathroom. The bed was lumpy. There was a leek in the ceiling dripping some sort of brown water that actually could have been blood.  The place smelled.  The tv did not work.  It took me about an hour of psyching myself up (pre menopausal wimp) to go complain.  Actually I went and asked for my money back. I use to travel a lot in a job I had when I worked for Western Union....this was the absolute worst ever. I think it was in Southern Ohio.

Anonymous said...

I think all hotel rooms are dirty after watching either 20/20 or one of those other news shows about them.  I stayed in a hotel that a group of tennis people were staying in that was recommended by a friend.  We were told it was wonderful.  The bars on the windows were my first sign that I was not in the most desirable place in the world.  Add to that a bug in my bed and that was all it took for me to make a beeline out of there with my daughter...

Anonymous said...

The Hon-Dah motel in McNary, AZ, 1984. Me and the X went snow skiing with my best friend and his wife. The bed sagged almost a foot in the middle, the floor was NASTY, and the heater wouldn't stop running. The Apache tribe burned it down later for the casino coming in.
Remo knows what goes on in motels. I never go barefoot (neither do my kids) and I always, always, look under the bed (Dead Hookers..)

Anonymous said...

well the worst for me was this mom and pop hotel on south beach..yeah it was cheap for south beach but at 3am the smell of cuban food beer and Urine doesnt make for an enjoyable experience.OH you have a tat
thats soooo sexxxy..sorry bout the guy with the crabs..ihope it wasnt the gift that "kept on giving"

Anonymous said...

Whoa! You were brave to stay there. My deceased husband did commercial refrigeration so I sat in the truck behind every beer joint in town. My worse motel was in corpus christi. It was the season and we didn't have reservations. We only stayed one night and came home. Thanks for your comment in my journal. Paula

Anonymous said...

Gee, this one is tough since my ex-husband's brother drove a Modified car on the NASCAR circuit.  We stayed in MANY cheapie motels (never a hotel).  Let's just say that a Motel Six to me was a 5 star hotel if we had a chance to stay in one of them!!
Hugs and love, Lisa

Anonymous said...

LOL... Ok, I can honestly say I have never [and would never] stay in a hotel so bad that I might come away with CRABS!!  Sheeesh... local Motel 6 not good enough for you or what??  tehehe... I require clean sheets and a bathroom that features intact tile work and a working shower.  LoL  I don't ask for much, but I ask that it be clean.  No blood stains.  No pesky body lice.  No broken locks or shady looking people hanging about on the balcony.  Call me a snob, I don't care.  LOL  

My mother actually had a nervous breakdown once and drove 6 hours away, then got a hotel room in which some kind of unknown demonic ritual had been performed.  The second bed had only a headboard and there were blood stains on the carpet.  She came home feeling like she'd been in the twilight zone.  Serves her right for going crazy and not taking more cash, I say.  :P

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Anonymous said...

A Motel 8 in East Texas. A whore had just finished a trucker at 9:00pm. when I checked in. The bed was still warm and the sheets were sticky. I turned on the TV with a pliers. No maid service at that hour. The desk clerk was building a plastic model car and didn't seem to care that my room smelled like fish, wet worms and cheap perfume.

Anonymous said...

Living the sheltered life I have led, there aren't many hotel rooms in my past, in fact I think all the ones I have stayed in have been well maintained and had a friendly helpful staff.  Kristi

Anonymous said...

Oh Robbie, I gotta say hand's down...its the "honeymoon suite" I booked for my honeymoon back a thousand years ago.  It was absolutely HORRIBLE!  I cried my eyes out...my husband got mad...went to the manager...got our money back...and we went down the road to the Holiday Inn.  LOL
I can't even remember the name of the place.  I had just read the advertizement for it, and thought...sounds great!  I honestly don't think its even in business anymore.  
-Connie

Anonymous said...

For me, best & worst were both in Paris, on my One International Journey. Best: Left bank, off a quaint little alley, with a tiny grille-work balcony that overlooked the classic "rooftops of Paris" view.  Worst: room I had to take next, once I got bounced from this quaint room because my reservation wasn't made in advance. The next one was a hellhole with a sink 2 inches from the bed, an incroixable-y RUDE House-Mistress who made me feel guilty for wanting to take a shower in the communal bathroom, and some yahoos in the next room, separated by a cardboard wall, doing God-Knows-What at God-Knows-What-Hour. --Albert

Anonymous said...

STEPHWEISS: I remember when I was a kid Holiday Inn and Sheraton were the primo hotels. Now they are just a step above the Motel Six types.

MIRAMINIAK ¡V LISA: I don¡¦t know which is worse the condom or the needle. That is beyond bleah, that¡¦s worthy of an EWWWWWWWWWWW!! ;-)

ALPHAWOMAN ¡V Mary: Well, hopefully, that wasn¡¦t there best room! Yuck!!!

KAREN: I think I saw that special! Where they tested the mattress and what not for the various ¡§things¡¨ remaining. Yeah! It¡¦s quite disgusting but at least make me ¡§think¡¨ that the place is clean. Yah know! Move a rag over the vanity and fold my toilet paper into a cute little ¡§V¡¨. I completely blacked out some of the ¡§school ¡Vactivity¡¨ related hotels that I stayed at as a kid. Those were some horrendous places. One in Ocean City, MD comes to mind.

SCREMO: ¡§Remo knows what goes on in motels.¡¨ „² Oh really??? Do tell! I thought ¡§cops¡¨ just used there patrol cars. ;-p

UBERDUDE: I love Cuban food and the smell of some cigars but mixed with Urine. Yuck!

Anonymous said...

PAULA: I’ve never been to Corpus but South Padre Island and Brownsville held a couple of slimy sleeze joints!

LISBNJVI – LISA: why is this the first time I’ve heard mention of an ex?

SLO: Blood Stains! Now that is over the top! Eeeks! I’ll have to be sure the next time I go crazy I have a stash of cash. You Snob!!! Hey, you asked. ;-p

RBUSHU: A doll like Mrs Beasley? Pull my string, see what this doll says. ;-)

LOTZAMOE: What I can’t help wondering is how you knew those sheets were sticky???? Ewwwww!!!

KRISTI: Are you bragging or complaining? There’s much to be said for a sheltered existence when it comes to stuff like this. But, you, sheltered? Ummm I do recall you saying you were a regular attendee of porn shops. Okay, so maybe you didn’t say regular but you went once. ;-)

CONNIE: So did hubby get mad because you were crying and he wasn’t getting any, or because of the condition of the room? ;-)

ALBERT: Kevin and I are planning a trip to Europe next year. I will be hitting you up for that best motel name on the Left Bank. :-)

Anonymous said...

Omigod, and I thought I'D had "weekends from Hell!"  (er, it's still so hard for me to picture you in an Army uniform!)  ¤Holly

Anonymous said...

Here's mine :)

http://journals.aol.com/ggal3133/LivinginSavannah/entries/695

Anonymous said...

HOLLY: It’s hard for me to imagine it now too! It was so long ago. But, I provided some of the pics as proof. Just goes to show, the military will take anyone! ;-)

GGAL: Thanks for playing along. I got a hoot out of yours. “Don’t put me down” LOL That must have been one nasty place!