Admittedly, we are a bunch of privileged people, travelling to grand places on our corporate expense accounts, staying at high end hotels. It’s a nice life that spoils us for when we travel on our own nickel. And yet, we still complain about the little things that come with this plush life on the road. It’s pretty silly. Sure, it’s fair to complain about the neighbors who came in drunk and loud and slamming doors at 4 am. One guy made a funny story out of getting into the shower and shampooing his hair with body lotion because who can read the small print on the small bottles of shampoo, conditioner and lotion? They always look remarkably similar. Except lotion doesn’t lather. More than one of us in the conversation spoke of a system we used prior to entering the shower to know exactly where we place each.
Then the discussion turned to shower controls that you can’t figure out. A few weeks ago, I had to leave a bathtub with four inches of grey water for housekeeping. For the life of me I had no idea how to open the drain.
Mattresses are the essential piece of the hotel experience and during this stay I found myself sleeping with a list towards the door. There is a worn divot near the edge of the bed and even when I try to move towards the center where it’s somewhat flatter, there is still the disconcerting feeling of listing all night. And while on the subject of the bed, I hate the way hotels make up their beds now. To save time, housekeeping lays all the sheet/blanket layers on the bed and does one tuck-in all around. So when you pull back the covers at night to climb in, the whole bed pulls apart. Does anyone else hate that?
Lights and electrical outlets are important to travelers too. There’s never enough of the former and plugs fall out of the latter. If you manage to accept all those indignities and get the lights out, you are left with blue lights taunting you from the TV and the clock. My last trip, the hard-wired smoke detector on the ceiling had a blinking light! Even with my eyes closed I saw every blink of that crazy thing. Everyone should have these problems, right? No really. Downtown Denver has a big homeless population and we walked by a lot of people tonight who would love a mattress, the free body products and they would never notice the blinking light. Helps to keep perspective.
Then the discussion turned to shower controls that you can’t figure out. A few weeks ago, I had to leave a bathtub with four inches of grey water for housekeeping. For the life of me I had no idea how to open the drain.
Mattresses are the essential piece of the hotel experience and during this stay I found myself sleeping with a list towards the door. There is a worn divot near the edge of the bed and even when I try to move towards the center where it’s somewhat flatter, there is still the disconcerting feeling of listing all night. And while on the subject of the bed, I hate the way hotels make up their beds now. To save time, housekeeping lays all the sheet/blanket layers on the bed and does one tuck-in all around. So when you pull back the covers at night to climb in, the whole bed pulls apart. Does anyone else hate that?
Lights and electrical outlets are important to travelers too. There’s never enough of the former and plugs fall out of the latter. If you manage to accept all those indignities and get the lights out, you are left with blue lights taunting you from the TV and the clock. My last trip, the hard-wired smoke detector on the ceiling had a blinking light! Even with my eyes closed I saw every blink of that crazy thing. Everyone should have these problems, right? No really. Downtown Denver has a big homeless population and we walked by a lot of people tonight who would love a mattress, the free body products and they would never notice the blinking light. Helps to keep perspective.