Meet Sparrow, an average man passing an average life…
Tuesday, April 30
One thing you learn over the years working front desks is you can generally ignore when a guest gives you an estimated time of arrival…Guests are notoriously inaccurate at giving these, usually erring on the early side, probably because they don’t want to piss us off by saying they are arriving too late, as if we care…I’m here all night…Come whenever you want…It’s OK…If my feet are up on the desk in the back, as they frequently are, I’ll take them off the desk and come serve you.
So when Mark told me Mr Gibson called and said he would be here at 0100, I dismissed it because odds were he’d be here later than that, if he made it at all because it is not unprecedented for people to call and tell us they would be here and not show up, tho that is, admittedly, rare.
Anyway, about 0050 – ten minutes before Mr Gibson’s announced arrival time – a lady comes to the front desk to buy some stuff – I forget what – and I note the time and wonder if Mr Gibson really will show up at 0100…It’s been a slow night and these things cross your mind.
Key here are the falsies…I generally take them out after the audit is done, however I put them in when I went to help the lady at the front desk…There is no reason to put guests thru the horror of seeing me look like a hockey player…It was the classic dilemma: leave the falsies in or take them back out, risking having to put them back in in a few minutes…After spending more time on it than I really should have – it was a slow night after all – I rolled the dice and decided to leave them in.
Every now and then life comes thru, because when one Mr Gibson says 0100 he means 0100…Not 0058 or 0102, zero-one-hundred, on the dot, dead solid perfect, the top of the hour…I had actually retired to the comfort of the back office when I heard the front door whiz open and I went out and a gentleman announced he was Mr Gibson and he had a reservation…I congratulated him on his punctuality, noting I had been told he would be here at 0100 and here it was 0100 on the dot and here he was.
I took up very little of his time…He had already been checked-in, of course, and I had his keys made, so all he had to do was provide a signature and a few initials while I told him about the breakfast vouchers and showed him how to get to his room and he was probably in bed by 0110.
I wasn’t bothered again until approximately 0527 when 166 called to ask if they needed to come by the front desk on their way out, or could they merely leave their keys in the room???…Really, tho, she was just looking for a reason to call and say nice things about her stay…This happens from time to time and when it does, you shut up and listen…She fawned over her entire stay, too…Her check-in was one for the ages and her room was so nice it should be retired forthwith and sent to the Smithsonian…The only way to acknowledge something like is to say thank you, I’m glad you enjoyed your stay…We do not want to waste the guest’s time by babbling incoherently, tho it’s OK to add we hope to see you again, but that’s about it.
The Wife was home when I woke up, for the first time in a few days because she had been off on one of her infernal house sitting ventures…Naturally, I reverted to the old bachelor habits, which used to be adorable but even I’m growing weary of them now…Well, no I’m not…If I was, I would have taken better care of the house, which was its usual fiasco…Clothes were everywhere, including the kitchen table, where I’d put my clean clothes for the week because it’s too much work to carry them all the way down the hall to the bedroom…Of course, there were dirty dishes but before I could wash them the clean dishes had to be put away, too.
I did do a pretty good job of straightening up tho…All dishes are now washed and, after limbering up, I took the clothes to the bedroom…I probably should have vacuumed, but I didn’t think about it…I did take care of the cat’s area, tho…Not only did I give her her treasured canned yummies, I replenished her dry food, gave her fresh water and cleaned her cat box, all of which she took for granted.
Sparrow’s Sleep Log: 1130 Tuesday until 1930 Tuesday…8.0 for the day and 23.0 hours for the week…Recall Monday I got a solid seven hours, not waking up until it was almost time to leave for the hotel – and regular readers of this crap know how I enjoy fretting over my sleep – so I was worried it would affect today’s sleep session but no…I started yawning around 0900 and I could have gone to sleep earlier but I decided to putz around the house for a little bit.
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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