Meet Sparrow, an average man passing an average life…
Sunday, June 21
Sold out!!!
I am not making that up…And it wasn’t some technicality, either, because half the rooms were out of order…Well, the remodel is still going on, I suppose, that cut the number of available rooms down to 94 but 93 of them were gone by the time I reported for duty and I didn’t have to bother hustling the other one because within ten minutes it had been booked online.
We’ve been having a problem with these online booking sites the past couple of months…I don’t know whose side the problem is on, but the virtual credit cards they issue for payment are not being approved until some time after the booking is made…This means that people who show up immediately after making their online booking – as happened with tonight’s final room – are seeing the credit card declined…Now, this doesn’t hold up their check-in…They paid the company – you can tell because on the computer screen the rate is highlighted in red, meaning don’t tell the guest, and it doesn’t show on their registration card – so we’ll get paid, but it does mean you have to do some fiddling…The system will try to authorize the card before check-in but since it declines you have to alter the amount being authorized to $0.00, which is easy enuff to do…Still, tho, it does delay the guest a little bit.
Despite being sold out rates weren’t all that great, an average of $105 or so, about half what we’d be getting for most rooms during a real summer season…In fact, Front Desk Manager Brandon said he was only asking $125 for the remaining room, a steal, instead of a lot more because he didn’t want to gouge anyone…I laffed, because Brandon is pretty sensitive about this but, you know, hotel rooms are the ultimate supply-and-demand commodity…It’s oh-dark-thirty and I have one room left and you need a place to sleep and I may not even lube the broom handle before issuing it to you…On the other hand, a month ago you could have named your price.
For some reason, I was moved to tell Brandon about the time in Sin City I actually did let a guy name his price…What happened was this dad came in with his boy and asked what we were asking and I was feeling frisky and shrugged and asked pleasantly what he wanted to pay…For his part he, too, shrugged and quoted me a rate that was $10 more than we were asking…Sold…Supply and demand.
Sold out means ol’ Sparrow was obliged to actually perform real front desk duties for the first time in three months…259 needed blankets…People came up for toiletries…Water was a big seller and I sold it, declining to tell guests some of the best tap water on the planet came out of the sink in their bathroom…The sundry stand needed significant restocking, too, for the first time in the Virus Era…Water, soda, sports drinks, ice cream, Choco-Tacos, even tampons, a first even for me…Still tho, I was committed to getting it done soonest, and I didn’t fart around at all and was back from delivering folios at 0140, more or less the time I’m done on slow nights when I do fart around.
Since the retailer is no longer selling my fave 3-pack of reading glass – the sort of half-frame deals that look distinguished on the edge of my nose – I bought some online this morning…Same half-frame deal, but I was able to specify green frames and I am presuming they are better made then the retailer’s house brand and will last longer, because the screws come out sooner than they probably should, but they’re only ten bucks for 3-pack, so you tolerate this.
The only fly in the ointment was my debit card kept getting declined…So I call the bank and the gal looks into it and says she’s getting an expiration date error and I check and it looks good…The card’s information was entered automatically and the expiration date shows 2025 but the month, for some reason, was showing May instead of February, which I didn’t realize until I’d tried to force the transaction thru a couple of more times.
There was even hilarity when the purchase was being rung up…The total for two glasses was $32, which qualified me for free shipping…But the 15% discount brought it under $30, allowing me to pay for shipping…Fortunately, shipping was less than the discount and I ended up paying a buck or so less.
I was worried about the cat for a bit today…She wasn’t there to greet me when I woke up, which isn’t unprecedented but when I hadn’t seen her after a couple of cups of coffee I took measures, not too worried, but you know…She wasn’t in her usual places and I finally found her on an old blanket she’d always liked that was on the floor in the spare bedroom…She was sitting quietly and didn’t move and I was still worried she might be sickies or something but when I got back from the gym she was at the door to greet me and began her usual fussing around, so I think she’s OK.
The scale at the gym reported I gained six pounds…I don’t understand, but the belt is already a bit looser, so it was a good weight gain.
Sparrow’s Sleep Log: 0900 Sunday until 1300 Sunday…4.0 hours for the day, tho hardly unprecedented start, to the sleep week…Regular readers of this crap know what the deal is: you get 12.0 hours of sleep Saturday, you don’t get that much sleep on Sunday…Thing is, I was tired, too, when I turned in, but when I woke up for the obligatory 1300 head call, that was all there is…
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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