Yay for Read Free Sunday (RFS) at The Diary.
It’s Sparrow, an average man passing an average life…
Saturday, August 14
Let me tell you something, Ol Sparrow moved some product tonight, with no less than four walkins resulting in a sold-out nite.
The first one came almost immediately after Amy left and the final three came consecutively – a rare enuff occurrence for graveyard – at around 0130 or so…One Mr D had called to inquire about vacancies and thought $200, plus tax, sounded OK and he said he’d be right in and immediately the doors open and the bell’s rung and I’m thinking wow, that is immediately, but it turned out to be Mr S…Mr S needed a room, too, so I quoted him the same rate and he took it and while I’m checking him in Mr D enters and shortly after that one Mr F wanders in and he says he’ll take the last room…All are advised this is for tonite only because we are sold out Saturday nite and all said they’re heading out in the morning, anyway.
Technically, it will look like we were three short of a sellout because three of the walkins were after the nite audit had been completed so these are technically rooms rented for Saturday nite, so tomorrow it will look like we rented three more rooms than we actually have, but everyone keeping score at home will mark it down as a sellout for tonite.
There were still five arrivals, tho…One shows up around 0200 and a bit later the guy with three rooms reserved calls to say they won’t be here until morning and please don’t rent their rooms…At some places it would have been a good thing he called because after a certain time – 0200 or 0300 or so – no shows are checked in, billed and then checked out and their rooms rented.
Not here, tho…I told him to fear not, that he’s already been checked in and everything is in order and we are awaiting your arrival, take your time and travel safely…If he got the impression the welcoming committee was standing by with trumpeting heralds dressed like the Swiss Guard, well, ol’ Sparrow has no control over that.
At 0300 ol’ Sparrow answers the phone and is treated to two voices talking simultaneously. One sounds automated – but it’s tuff to tell – saying there’s an entrapment in Elevator 1…Oopsies…Then there’s a woman announcing her rugrat had hit the button…So you can presume everything is OK but while our goal here is to get as much project work done as we can while on the clock, you gotta check this out because presuming is not the same as knowing…So I got to Elevator 2 first because I’ve always thought that was Elevator 1 and press the button and the elevator reports for duty so then I go to the real Elevator 1 and do the same thing with the same result…So there wasn’t an entrapment and the voice announcing there was was automated and not the husband sounding really calm.
(The one thing you don’t do is go off half-cocked and start calling people like the fire department or Luke the Maintenance Guy until you know exactly what is going on…Readers are referred to Nite Audit Rule #3: don’t wake anybody else unless entire wings are falling down.)
Some wizard has changed the way the ice cream sandwiches – Klondikes, Reece’s, M&Ms – are displayed….Before, they were all laid on their backsides, rather sensibly if you ask me…This wasn’t good enuff for some up-and-coming marketing wizard here – there are no suspects – and now the ice cream sandwiches are standing on their bottom edge…Actually, there were only Klondike and M&M sandwiches out there because the Reece’s sandwiches were replaced by those infernal Push-Up while I was gone for two nites…I was going to change them, but it was pretty slammed tonite, so perhaps I’ll get to it tomorrow when we’re sold out again.
We are already sold out for Saturday nite and just for funsies ol’ Sparrow checked online to see if anyone had any availability at all for tonight and the answer to that query was no…Now, a couple of people will get lucky because we have a couple of rooms on hold just to keep our options open and others probably do, too, but if the Interstate south of here doesn’t reopen today as scheduled, there’s going to be the usual number of weary travelers needing a place to stay tonight.
Being sold out tonight caused some of our firefighters problems because they weren’t allowed to extend their stays…Almost two dozen were obliged to check out and come back Sunday…Some said they booked rooms in the next county, but some said they’ll be shacking up for the nite at the county airport, something they seemed to be looking forward to.
Sparrow’s Sleep Log:
0930 Saturday until 1330 Saturday
1630 Saturday until 2130 Saturday
9.0 hours for the day and 49.5 hours for the week.
Now, these are both satisfactory totals but what in thee hell is the deal with the split sleep sessions we’ve been having on Saturdays/Sundays off and on lately???…I don’t know, either…I woke up at 1330 to use the can and upon return to the sack not even several patented Sparrow Roll Overs (SRO) could produce slumber…So yours truly woke up, got in some project work and some reading before starting to nod off again.
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.
Gaylon’s books can also be found at The Reading Salon.
