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The Attack of the Suspiciously Large Words!

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  • The Attack of the Suspiciously Large Words!

    It's been a week since this happened with no further notices or updates, so I'm going to guess it's okay to tell the tale.

    First, though, let me ask you a question:

    Have you ever tried to keep cats out of the bedroom?

    If you have, then you know. If cats are denied full run of the bedroom, they will make it their life's mission to get into that bedroom. They will lurk outside the door for hours on end and meow and scratch at the carpet until they tear up hunks of it. They will sprint inside the instant the door opens even a crack and scurry under the bed where they know you can't reach them. If the door is left open while the cats are in some other part of the house, they will tumble over themselves and slam into walls in their all-encompassing need to rush inside. If shoved out and dispatched to the hall with the broom, the cats will resume lurking and plotting other ways to get into that bedroom. They know no other purpose. Their life has no other meaning.

    The situation is much the same with locals and hotels. Deny them entry and they crave it all the more, and they will do anything, go to any length, to get into a hotel. They will use expired out-of-state drivers licenses. They will employ friends and relatives from out of town. They will make reservations online solely for the purpose of getting into a hotel, any hotel, which denies them entry.

    Now, you may ask, why are locals denied entry to hotels? For many good reasons, but the most succinct answer is found in the hotel that not long ago and not too far away from me which had to strip two of its rooms down to the bare concrete and cinderblocks and start over after some locals set up a meth lab in them.

    That's why. And that's also why we here at Elongated Hexagon Inn deny rooms to locals. There's no reason for anyone local to stay here; we don't even have jacuzzi suites, like some properties do. We just have rooms. Expensive rooms, yes, but just plain rooms.

    Last Sunday, a local made a prepaid reservation via one of the online travel sites. There are many such sites; they breed in the damp, like mildew. This guest brought her boyfriend along with her to check in. We shall call them Lady and Methmouth. The manager explained to Lady that due to the nature of her reservation, the room had been paid for through the online site, but that we needed to collect a credit card for incidental expenses. Somehow, sitting halfway across the lobby, Methmouth got it into his drug-addled head that we were refusing them service, which is actually what we should have done. He started yelling across the lobby to Lady and the front desk staff. We suspect it was at this point that Methmouth began his plan to get money back from the hotel, as we do offer the "Please Steal From Us" Guarantee, which states that if you are not completely satisfied with your stay, you get it for free.

    Twice before I even came on shift, he had called down to complain, saying first that the tub would not hold water and second that the room was just not what he had expected. Considering that what he likely expected was a 1970's vintage trailer bedroom with blistering particle-board paneling that reeked of meth fumes, this is not such a stretch. Anyway, though, he settled down and we hoped that would be the last we would hear of him for the night.

    It was not to be. On one of his first rounds after the other staff departed, leaving only the security guard and myself, the security guard noticed so much water pooled in the hallway that it was reflecting the hallway lights back at him. This was a problem for many reasons, but perhaps the most alarming reason is that the room was on the fifth floor. Water on the fifth floor is not a good thing because in due course it becomes water on the fourth floor, water on the third floor, and so on.

    He knocked on the door and found what he thought was Lady and Methmouth coked out of their heads. He would know. He comes from a background in law enforcement. Calls were made and managers were awakened. Two managers conferred and agreed to let Lady and Methmouth stay even after this, but we would need to get the water up. And so the security guard had to go up to the fifth floor at one in the morning and suck up about ten gallons of water from the carpet with a very noisy Shop-Vac. I was down at the desk dealing with extremely irate guests wondering why the hell someone was vacuuming at one in the morning, including one guest who uttered the immortal lines, "Jesus Christ! I've never seen anything like you guys!" before slamming down his phone. As you can imagine, this resulted in several Please Steal From Us Guarantees being issued in the morning.

    Meanwhile, over the next two hours, Methmouth wandered the building and made sure to talk up both the security guard and myself.

    Picture it: A man with a mismatched skeleton, one half of which was about four inches higher than the other, with rotted black stumps for teeth, staggering around the building. Also, we noticed, he was on a cell phone in between conversations with us. Then we noticed that every time he came up to us to talk after another bout on the phone, his story changed and was growing more elaborate. It went from his girlfriend falling in the tub, to her having a possible concussion, to her slipping on soap residue in the bottom of the tub, to a possible skull fracture. Also, he made sure to tell us, her pupils were dilated.

    I did not and do not believe he even had any idea what those words even mean. Having meth mouth is a pretty good indicator of low intelligence. We suspected that someone on the phone was coaching him in an effort to lay in a scam. We didn't take the bait because to offer to call 911 implies culpability. We didn't offer, on the basis that if she really did fall, and really did hurt her head, Methmouth would have enough sense to call for an ambulance on his own. He never did. Instead, he called other hotels across town looking for another room and telling them that they had checked in here and -- poor, innocent lambs -- their room had flooded through no fault of their own and we weren't helping them at all! If you can even imagine our nerve. I learned about this when another hotel called me to ask what the hell was going on.

    It should also be noted that during his conversations with us, Methmouth noted that their car and luggage and ID had all been stolen -- which was part of the reason all of the other hotels were telling him to go to hell when he called them. No ID, no room. Period. Finally, Methmouth called a cab and while the cab driver waited in the lobby, we warned him of what he was getting into. And at last Methmouth and Lady and their luggage all rode off into the night.

    But not to the hospital. I checked.

    I suspect that having been frustrated in trying to get us to admit to wrongdoing, and not having any way to soak us for money, they gave up. Later, we discovered that in addition to flooding their bathroom, they had tried to soak it up with the comforters off the beds, they had torn the smoke detector off the ceiling, and had also broken the closet door. All of this is in addition to flooding the hallway, and the water that seeped down the wall into the fourth floor hallway. All of it was documented and if they do try to resurrect their scam later, we're going to fire back with drywall damage, and repairs to the room.

    And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why we don't rent to locals. Locals are the reason we can't have nice things.

    Bonus Scam!

    As I started to write this, the phone rang. It was a woman, who sounded drunk, who claimed her grandparents had staid here earlier in the month and were extremely displeased with their room. The manager had agreed to a monetary refund, which was waiting for her to pick it up at the front desk. Several things are wrong with this, but to sum it up, it's complete horseshit. She was able to give me a -- very common -- last name, but had some trouble getting the first name, or the state where her supposed grandparents were from. In the end, I told her she would have to try again tomorrow when actual management is here.

    I rather hope she does. It ought to be great fun.
    Last edited by Antisocial_Worker; 10-27-2014, 10:21 AM.
    Drive it like it's a county car.

  • #2
    Please tell us that:

    1) The credit card the methheads used is valid
    2) Your hotel is going to charge them for the damages

    That was an epic tale, and a real mess on top of that. The tale of the meth lab in the other hotel was insane, one has to wonder just how could they get all their equipment in without _somebody_ noticing?

    Comment


    • #3
      Quoth eltf177 View Post
      Please tell us that:

      1) The credit card the methheads used is valid
      2) Your hotel is going to charge them for the damages

      That was an epic tale, and a real mess on top of that. The tale of the meth lab in the other hotel was insane, one has to wonder just how could they get all their equipment in without _somebody_ noticing?
      The card they used to pay the online site was valid, and therefore the card that site paid us with was valid. As to whether they stole the card they used to pay the online site, I neither know nor care.

      I never heard anything about damages, so hopefully everything was easily, quickly, and cheaply repaired.

      As far as the meth lab goes, you really don't need a lot of equipment. The "shake-n-bake" labs just need chemicals and a soda bottle -- but they do have a tendency to explode.
      Drive it like it's a county car.

      Comment


      • #4
        No doubt when they finally get arrested and put in a lock up, they will profess to never touching the stuff. I know that a favorite of the methheads I deal with. Right up til the withdrawals start.

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        • #5
          My brain is breaking with the Bonus Scam. In what universe would that ever work? Do any hotels even OFFER cash refunds? Even if you pay in cash?

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          • #6
            I am curious about one thing, what do locals do if they're having their house fumigated, and have to stay in a hotel for a few days? Do they rent to them if they have proof they need the room? That's rather common after all, having work done where you can't stay in the house.

            Comment


            • #7
              Quoth Silent-Hunter View Post
              I am curious about one thing, what do locals do if they're having their house fumigated, and have to stay in a hotel for a few days? Do they rent to them if they have proof they need the room? That's rather common after all, having work done where you can't stay in the house.
              I was going to ask the same thing. I can actually think of several reasons a local might want to get a room, for example sometimes my husband and I will spend our anniversary weekend at a local hotel rather than traveling somewhere.

              I think the only time I ever had an issue was when I was living in a college dorm and my boyfriend came up for the weekend. He wasn't allowed in the dorm so we went to get a room and the front desk person asked a lot of questions about why we needed a room if I lived in town.
              TANSTAAFL

              Comment


              • #8
                I'd like to know that too. I stayed in a hotel the last time I moved. I had moved out of my apartment, my lease was up, but my flight wasn't until the next morning. It was Vegas, so I didn't have any trouble getting a hotel. But now I wonder if I'd have had a problem if I was living in a small town in the same situation.

                Comment


                • #9
                  The Elongated Hexagon has always treated me and my family very well. It sucks that you had to deal with this pair of crazies and their destructiveness.
                  "Sigh, I'm going to Hell.....but I'm going with a smile on my face." -- Gravekeeper

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    I'd dare say that the No-Local's rule is one that can be exceptionned easily if circumstances demanded it. But it's a blanket rule otherwise to not specifically single out the sort of clients who like to create and partake in illegal substances.

                    In any case, these particular clients didn't sound like locals suffering from the sort of residential hardships that would warrant an exception.

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      locals

                      I have been working at hotels on midnight shifts for 20 plus years.

                      I can think of a few reasons why locals would need a room.

                      1, Power outages.
                      2, House being rebuilt after damage - insurance companies pay for it.
                      3. Want a night out - use of pool and jacuzzi.
                      4. Fight with spouse - cops will bring abused spouses in.

                      We will rent to locals but do require credit card or hundred bucks deposit which is nonrefundable if you smoke in the room or cause damage.

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                      • #12
                        Wow, what a bunch of losers! Kind of makes you wonder where the 2 meth-heads actually came from and why they couldn't stay there. Staked out by the cops? Burned down by accident (or by rival methheads?) Too stoned to remember where it is? The mind boggles....

                        As for locals staying in hotels, there's a lovely new one across the street from where I work. I hope that if I ever get stuck in a major snowstorm at work, I can go there instead. I've got state ID, work ID, and would expect to pay the going rate. It sure would beat trying to sleep on the floor or the smelly old vinyl couch in the "lounge" (aka coat room) at work!
                        When you start at zero, everything's progress.

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          We get a lot of people taking pictures of the sign by the front desk that informs any and all of our no locals policy. Many remark they've never seen anything like it. It does say at the bottom, though, that exceptions are made in the event of inclement weather, power outages and the like, and that those and other situations are at the discretion of management.

                          Personally, I can understand renting say, a jacuzzi suite, but we don't have those. Our property has no suites at all, and the only room we ever regularly rent to locals is the meeting room which has a bed that folds up into the wall so the room can be used as a guest room if needed. Other than that, there's no good reason for a local to stay with us. The hotel where I work now, as well as the two others where I used to work, discovered the hard way that nine times out of ten, if a local wants a room, it's because the local is either using or offering the services of a hooker, or they need a place to shoot up with or manufacture something illegal.
                          Drive it like it's a county car.

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            Quoth figgyx View Post
                            I have been working at hotels on midnight shifts for 20 plus years.

                            I can think of a few reasons why locals would need a room.

                            1, Power outages.
                            2, House being rebuilt after damage - insurance companies pay for it.
                            3. Want a night out - use of pool and jacuzzi.
                            4. Fight with spouse - cops will bring abused spouses in.

                            We will rent to locals but do require credit card or hundred bucks deposit which is nonrefundable if you smoke in the room or cause damage.
                            To this list you can also add:

                            5. Water outage
                            6. Sewer backup (municipalities will often shut off the water to allow workers to clean the sewer without more water adding to the mess)
                            7. Natural gas outage (I remember this happened in Maryland one winter some time back, if your house has only gas heat this can be a real problem)
                            8. Emergency night work (gas company employees having to use a jackhammer @ 1am make a pretty loud racket)

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              I stayed in a local hotel once. I work nights and we needed a new furnace installed. Contractors do not like working at night, and I do not like people in my room when I sleep.

                              But, I fully understand the reasoning behind the "no locals" thing and you guys do make exceptions, so I have no complaints.
                              I might be crazy, but I'm not Insane.

                              What? You don't play with flamethrowers on the weekends? You are strange.

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