It’s Sparrow, an average man passing an average life…
Monday, June 16
It’s tuff to believe that three days of the light tai chi movements had a significant effect on me, but another manifestation, after not doing them – as a field test – Sunday nite was we were yawning on our way into the hotel, virtually unheard of after a decent rest…So we will get back to it when we wake up Monday nite…There were too many benefits to fret over getting to sleep an hour or so later.
Romeo was there when we reported to the hotel, and he was pretty busy…Not with some hotel stuff, but with printing new menus for the restaurant, specifically on the fancy-pants legal-size paper they bought for the purpose…We were of zero help whatsoever here, tho he eventually figured it out.
Speaking of the restaurant, a gal from the home office was nosing around both there and in the back office…Her name is Clarissa and tho it’s the first time we’ve run into each other, she’s been here for a month…Not only is there a new breakfast menu, but the restaurant closed for lunch this week, tho that only be temporary due to staffing issues…Maybe not, tho, because the hotel as had staffing issues for years – even back to the old owner – and they’ve been worse lately and our own opinion is lunch won’t happen again for a while.
Later, Romeo fielded a call from a man who asked whether a credit card and some sunglasses had been left in the restaurant…Romeo went and checked and sure enuff they had…Later, he came to claim them and Romeo gave them to him despite the fact the name on the card was a chick’s name…Valerie Something or Other…Later, we gently suggested it might be best to only return credit cards to the actual owner…Actually, regular readers of this crap know this is a Sparrow Rule (SR)…Not a guideline or a suggestion which can be adhered to or ignored at need, but a rule that must be followed in every situation…Romeo said he saw my point.
(This terminology was requisitioned from the Apollo space programs, where mission rules were not to be broken, tho mere guidelines gave mission commanders some leeway.)
Ol’ Sparrow was obliged to make one of the famous “tuff calls” that nite auditors are sometimes required to make and longtime readers of this crap know we never – and never means not once – shy away from making them…The problem arose when Ms G’s credit card was declined when we went to authorize it and check her in before the nite audit was run…Now, it should be noted her stay was being paid for with points, so the authorization was only for incidentals…Still, tho, we had to decide whether to cancel the reservation and risk her showing up, or check her in and risk her not showing up.
We chose the former, on the theory that most who have their credit cards declined for any reason seldom show up…Needless to say, she did…And this wasn’t Problem of the Year, either, because it’s a simple matter to reinstate the reservation…But those with any nite audit instincts whatsoever are already seeing the problem: checking in after the audit means as far as The System is concerned, she is checking on Sunday and not on Saturday for a 2-nite stay and not a 3-nite stay because the business day has already been advanced.
And even this usually isn’t a problem, because it is another simple matter to post room and tax for Saturday nite…But it’s a reward club points stay, and we had some zero clue how to post a reward club room rate…So we didn’t bother because as likely as not we’d screw something up…Keenan had didn’t know how to do it, either, and said he’d refer the matter to AMG Tammy.
The big news is we could not get the new phone transfer system to work…Before heading out to walk the hotel we followed the instructions we had been given:
- Hit the Cell On button on the landline display…This gets you dial tone on the landline;
- Hi “0”…This transfers the call, and you can see the front desk cell ring;
- Answer the phone and hit the star key.
But this didn’t work…We got a phone call while walking the hotel and we couldn’t hear anyone and it’s unlikely they heard us.
Keenan had a solution for this one, tho: When you answer the cell, wait until it makes a certain sound and then hit the star key…We field-tested this a couple of times and it worked great.
Sparrow’s time for walking 4.2 miles at the track.
Boy, today’s walk was a triumph…We resumed our tai chi exercises beforehand…Not only did we set the PB noted above at the track ( a suh-weet 4.27 mph pace), we got some new insoles for our shoes, so afterward we didn’t feel like we’d just walked across the Gobi Desert barefoot…Now, it should be noted we did run – well, jog – on some straitaways so it wasn’t all walking, but less than an hour for 4.2 miles is pretty good for an old(er) man.
The gym was packed, too, so for shoulder therapy we took five- and eight-pound dumbbells to a back room where no one else was…We did some stretching there, too.
Sparrow’s Sleep Log: 1030 Sunday until 1700 Sunday…6.5 hours for the day, a lackluster start to the sleep week.
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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.
The Diary of a Nobody was inspired by the 19th-century British novel of the same name.
Coming soon! Gaylon’s books in actual book form!
