Travel Log -- NIGHT 2

You can stay here if you swear not to tell anyone

By the end of Day 2 we didn’t know where we would stop. One thing we did know for certain: it didn’t matter how much the hotel cost as long as it was nice; I’m not even talking Holiday Inn nice. We were going for broke – I needed a shower. And I was sick of wearing my flip flops indoors.

I think we were in Ohio when we finally decided to call it a night. We spotted a Hampton Inn from the Interstate and lumbered through town to the hotel. It was after 11 p.m. by the time we were face to face with the front desk personnel. We asked for a room and were disappointed to hear the only availability was a smoking room. They allowed us to check it out before deciding and we did, but one whiff and we were gagging. Clearly this wasn’t going to work.

Maybe it was our ragged appearance or maybe the lady thought my husband was hot and could be convinced to hang out with her based on my looks – for some reason she took pity on us. She had one room left. It was a handicap-access room. Not only that, she could give it to us for a deal (I can’t exactly recall her rationale for helping us – again, it probably goes back to my hot husband). So for $80 (the room originally sold for $170/night), the spacious first-floor handicap-access room was ours. I can’t remember being so happy about a hotel room. Yes, the bed was slightly smaller, but who cares! The sheets were clean, the furniture new, the bathroom gigantic (handicapped, remember) and I was in heaven.

In the morning we dined on pastries and orange juice from the hotel’s free continental breakfast (what luxury!). We took leisurely showers and I even changed from the same clothes I’d worn the entire trip. Ok, maybe I only changed my shirt, but that’s beside the point.

I waited in the truck while Chris checked out. Though I had a peaceful night’s rest, I became increasingly annoyed at the length of time it took Chris to check out. Don’t you just hand them the key?

That would have been easy. But here’s what happened: When Chris went to check out, the desk person (someone besides the lady on duty during the previous night shift) had no record of our stay. She checked her computer, fumbled with papers and nothing. Unfortunately, since we paid for our entire trip with cash, Chris had no credit card receipt. In fact, he didn’t have any receipt (which might be because he paid in cash and saw no need for saving it, but he has no recollection of ever receiving one). The front desk lady kept asking how we got into the room. Chris pointed to the key – duh. “How did you get the key?” “We’re moving, we have all of our stuff in a truck, we needed a place to stay, we paid for a room, the lady making googley eyes at me gave us a deal, etc., etc., etc.”

The lady made Chris write down his cell phone number so they could call if there were any problems. I would have liked to receive that phone call, “Um, Hi, this is the Hampton Inn of Nowhere, Ohio. You stayed here recently and we have absolutely no record of your stay. We just wanted to call and confirm this.”

Chris: “Sorry, I think you have the wrong number.”