Meet Sparrow, an average man passing an average life…
Monday, August 10
Slow tonight at the hotel…We had 85 rooms rented, low normally but we’ll take it with all things considered, but none of them stopped by the front desk…They were all content to leave me alone and I didn’t see anyone until guests started rolling in for morning coffee service.
Breakfast was slim pickings this morning…Friday and Saturday nites were sold out and the spread was particularly ravaged yesterday, so much so there weren’t any replenishments left…There was enuff to put out a decent spread but boy, if there is anything more than cursory interest this morning, Tammy is going to run out…I didn’t even need my knife to open anything because the remaining packages were already open.
About 0300 there was a phone call from a guy trying to book a room online…He said his credit card kept getting declined and could I help???…Of course, I can, so we start in and I throw some rates out there and it turns out he wants to reserve with his reward club points…Well, sir, I can’t do that here…Well, how in the hell am I supposed to book???…Fabulous, someone else who wants to get cross and take it to the next level…Jesus H, people, I’m trying to help, don’t go sorehead on me…Eventually, he calmed down and I suggested he doublecheck the information he’s entering…My debit card was declined a number of times once and it turned out the month on the expiration date when it was auto entered was incorrect.
About 0600 an older gent in a US Navy shirt wandered in for some coffee and it turned out he was an eye doctor in the Navy back in the 70’s…He was young and had just gotten his bachelor’s degree and was looking to attend eye doctor school and the Navy needed eye doctors and paid his way in exchange for a three-year commitment…I noted that didn’t seem to be too bad a deal and he said no, it was great and he wanted to stay in but his wife didn’t want to do a tour in Spain, so he resigned his commission, hardly the first person I’ve met over the years who wanted to stay in but got out because a wife/husband wanted them to.
Slow at the Veterans Service Office (VSO) today…There were no messages for me and the four emails were nothing important, either…I am buying an awful lot of milk for the VSO, tho…I keep some cereal for the days I come directly from the hotel, which prevents yours truly, generally, from going to the fast-food place for a morning meal…The problem is ol’ Sparrow buys some milk and it expires before it gets used…Heck, today, there were two expired half-gallons of milk in the Building Department refrigerator, both of which I poured down the drain this morning…I suspected this might happen and had the foresight to buy a pint of milk at the retailer after the hotel to stave off starvation, but I am going to try to avoid wasting so much.
In the mail today was my Legion membership card for the year…This was funny because I hadn’t paid it yet, so I emailed Stanko wondering what the deal was and he wrote back saying the post paid my dues because I am the post’s service officer, too, and it’s a requirement for the county VSO to be a Legion member so they pay it…He added I could reimburse the post or not as I saw fit.
It’s been several years since I’ve actually paid my own membership because last year was the final year of a three-year membership deal the national office had that the post paid for, too, because I was post commander at the time.
Sparrow’s Sleep Log: 1530 Monday until 2130 Monday…6.0 hours for the day and 14.0 hours for the week, an utterly depressing Monday total.
I did sleep straight thru, tho, and I credit the grape seed extract pills I bought at the health food store this morning…Recall I ran out a few days ago and I’ve needed to use the can more than usual…I had to fight off the urge to take a handful to make up for the few days I missed, too…You know how us guys can get: if two is the recommended dosage, then 17 should get everything back to normal soonest…I only took two, tho.
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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