It’s Sparrow, an average man passing an average life…
Monday, October 4
Assistant Front Desk Manager Q was there when ol’ Sparrow reported for duty and he reported it had been a busy shift, with strong walk-in traffic and not only were we sold out for tonite, but genuinely and truly overbooked for tomorrow because some stayover requests had been “pushed thru” without bothering to check if we actually had rooms available.
One problem was a company that is a really good customer forgot to make reservations for their crew for the week and they all walked in this afternoon…Fortunately, we had some rooms available but after a few of their guys/gals checked in BOOM we were sold out for Monday, too, and it was not one of these deals where you can clear it by upgrading or downgrading someone…Q didn’t seem particularly worried about it, tho, because these things tend to work themselves out, either by an early departure or a cancellation.
And we don’t have the usual 117 rooms available, either, because the renovation of the 247-267 wing has begun, so there are 20 rooms out of commission…Only the longest of longtime readers of this crap will recall the first wing – 101-125 – was just getting started when I started here three years ago and each wing has two floors and there are two off-seasons each year when you can remodel and whatnot, so I suppose it’s right on schedule.
Amy relieved me this morning, the first time she’s relieved me at a hotel front desk in 3-4 years, since we were both at Hotel B…I’d actually known she was coming in because I scoped out the schedule a couple of days ago, but had forgotten about it, which is good because Amy is habitually late and had ol’ Sparrow remembered he would’ve been fretting about this non-stop…Heck, what with Amy having worked swing shift Sunday nite and having to drive home to the next county and back to the hotel for a Sunday AM shift she might not have shown up until mid-afternoon.
But she was more or less on time early, in fact, by established Amy standards…It was 0702 and I was actually in the preliminary stages of cursing out Front Desk Manager Brandon, who’s been relieving me while Tammy’s on vacation, when Amy walked in, looking tired but otherwise ready for duty.
At the retailer after the hotel, I bought some almond milk and some cereal for my triumphant return to the veterans service office (VSO)…And, get this, I bought yet another one of those suh-weet quarter-zip pullovers…I am not making that up, this time rolling the green one, to complement the brick red and the blue one purchased recently…These are the perfect additions to the Sparrow Winter Collection (SWC), warm enuff to be a useful layer, but light enuff to be worn on their own when it’s only cool and these puppies will be in heavy rotation until Memorial Day.
It was moderately busy at the VSO this morning…None of the veterans I spoke with last Wednesday at the Community Center when the VA was in town called like they insisted they would and there were only two voicemails and not too many emails…The number of voicemails might seem low, but the away message specified I’d be out of the office until today and to call back then…There was not an invitation to leave a message.
Jerry came by, tho…His had been one of the messages and he’d warned he needed to see me…Recall Jerry’s the atomic veteran who in 1955 had been close enuff to an atomic bomb test to have practically been a member of the detonation crew…He, and other atomic vets, had been battling the VA for ages because they now had skin cancers and some had been unable to have kids and last year we were not only able to get Jerry a disability rating but also 13 years of back pay.
Anyway, he was recently diagnosed with a blood cancer whose name is unpronounceable to anyone outside of the medical profession and the doctor included a letter saying it was as likely as not caused by having been five feet away from ground zero…(Actually, there was an underlying condition that had gotten worse)…Jerry wanted to file a claim and because he had his paperwork we were able to send in what’s known as a fully developed claim today, along with my usual Statement in Support of Claim, to make painfully clear to the VA exactly what we are seeking…As always, the statement was polite and non-threatening, merely pointing out the diagnosis and the doctor’s findings and respectfully requesting an appropriate disability rating.
Sparrow’s Sleep Log: 1430 Monday until 2130 Monday…7.0 hours for the day – about the most you can expect from the Monday Sleep Session (MSS) – and a not-too-bad 12.0 hours for the week.
———
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.
———
Gaylon’s books can also be found at The Reading Salon.
