Meet Sparrow, an average man passing an average life…
Sunday, March 29
The hotel is still open…Front desk manager Brandon’s truck was there when I pulled in and, as noted here before, no one likes to see the boss’s truck there when the night auditor reports for duty, but he was merely wrapping up swing shift and wasn’t wielding an ax… Besides, he would have texted and let me know if the hotel had actually closed.
As it is, there isn’t a whole lot of business…We are only open because of a condition that allows hotels to accept people working in town, or government employees or others on the job…We are not allowed to accept bookings for leisure travelers, altho Brandon said if the guest can provide the name of a company – any company – we can note that on the reservation and let them stay.
We had five rooms in-house tonight: two Greyhound drivers, a all of them had accounts that were direct billed to a home office and, for the first time in my tenure here, there were no folios to delivery and the only reason the audit wasn’t done until 0010 is the fact we can’t actually bill rooms until after midnight.
Front desk hours have been cut exponentially…We are down to one desk clerk per shift now, instead of the two there used to be for days and swing shifts…Amy was laid off and Q is now working the other three audit shifts…Idly, I asked Brandon if Q – who despises working graveyards – was whining about that and he said yeah, and the fact he was only working three nights a week, tho regular readers of this crap will recall Q actually gave notice last summer for a night audit job at a luxury timeshare on the mountain only to lose it when everyone discovered Q does not possess a driver’s license…So his seniority is now near the bottom.
There was some modest excitement near the end of the shift…First, about 0530, I was preparing the housekeeping report and noticed someone – Q is the lead suspect – had made a new cover sheet…The old one had been abused enuff thru countless copyings that it wasn’t centered anymore and starting to fade besides…It looked really sharp, too…Q is the lead suspect because Amy and I had long been using the old, crappy one, neither of us in a mood to change it.
Then about 0550 the front desk bell rang…I go out and don’t see anybody at first, but then I spot a guy at the sundry stand and he brings a bottle of the premium SuperSmart Water up…These are $2.50 and he gives me three dollars and declares he doesn’t need his change, presenting a potential inventory control problem and we’re so slow I actually the matter no small amount of thought…I have no desire to keep the excess 50 cents for myself and I suppose I could’ve tossed it in a drawer and forgotten about it, but I was feeling frisky and concluded I had two options: I could ring up a miscellaneous $3 item, but then the SuperSmart Water inventory would be off – presuming someone kept track, which they don’t…Ultimately, I decided to ring up the $2.50 water sale and then added a 50 cent miscellaneous transaction so everything balanced.
Despite the fact I didn’t sleep all that long (see Sleep Log below) I got my now-usual 2-mile walk-in…It was in the 40s, a full 20 degrees warmer than Saturday, tho it was overcast with a slight breeze…And even tho it was Sunday, there was still some mail, delivered after I’d visited yesterday: the latest edition of the Legion magazine and a postcard of all things, from my buddy Chris in Texas…Chris is locked down, too, and this replaced his spring break vacation postcard.
I tried something new to eat tonight…When I went to the retailer Saturday they were out of the canned deviled ham and chicken salad – the one with the pic of Satan on the label – but they did have cans of what was labeled simply as Potted Meat…Well, you know…I’m on my own now and we long ago established I dislike cooking for myself and the sandwich is certainly a staple of the Sparrow diet and canned, spreadable meat offers a tasty, quick meal…Key was the cost: 50 cents a can, a full $1.10 cheaper than the Satan spread and well in step with the new economies I’ve implemented since we were all locked down last week…I got five cans, tho I was too scared to read the label and see exactly what meat(s) were actually included.
It wasn’t too bad…It wasn’t as good as the Satan spreads, but enuff mayo can make postage stamps relatively tasty and one can was perfect for one sandwich, so all in all I give it – if not high marks – at least OK marks.
Sparrow’s Sleep Log: 0900 Sunday until 1330 Sunday…4.5 hours for the day…I fell asleep easily enuff and I suppose I could have rolled over a couple-three more hours but the cat heard me stir and let it be known my presence was required in the living room and that decided it…Besides, I am enjoying getting up early and having an afternoon to myself which is funny because I have the rest of my life to myself right now.
The March sleep month ended yesterday, too, and I neglected to include the monthly average, which 43.125 hours per week, a dreadfully low total, tho March was not an easy month…It was the lowest monthly figure since May of last year.
The Diary of a Nobody is a novel. All elements are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Anything else is a coincidence.
It was inspired by the 19th-century British novel of the same name.
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