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No Room at the Inn?!?
So the flight over was okay except for the exceptionally whiny child diagonally across the aisle from me. I got to the hotel at about 9pm local time (midnight back home) to find they were overbooked (people who were supposed to check out that day never did), and while they could put me up (on a sofa bed) I couldn't have a real room. Okay. No big deal. I got on the shuttle bus to go to the next tower (around the corner and down the street). The door guy at the West Tower told the shuttle driver he couldn't stay, because he was on the lookout for an ambulance.
Riiiiight. I off load my bags a quick as I could and wandered into reception looking for the elevator. I get on the elevator and look for the button for 12 - being the floor I am staying on. No 12. I glance over at the other side panel and see it *has* a 12, so I push it and we're off!
I get to the room feeling grimy and sweaty from hauling my bags around and just looking forward to a quick wash and bed. No bed. They had assured me that while it was a sofa-bed it was currently made up as a bed. It looked remarkably like a sofa to me. So I turn around and go back downstairs (leaving my bags behind). I get back down to the desk to find, yes, an ambulance had pulled up, fire engines were pulled up outside, and the EMTs were IVing someone lying in a knot of people in the private event room just beyong the reception area. I go and talk to the nice lady at reception and she promised me she'd call housekeeping and have the sofa transfigured soon. I told her I was going to the restaurant to eat a late dinner. I had been going ti skip dinner and go straight to bed, but airplane food is so disgusting all I ate was the dinner roll that had the consistency of styrofoam.
So I ate and when I returned to my room (really the "ite" part of a "suite" - or a "parlor") the sofa had indeed been transfigured. I don't care how good it is, a sofa bed is never a comfortable sleeping surface. I think I had a total of four hours sleep. The morning shower was tepid, because while I could get hot water to run in the tub, I could not get it to come out the shower head. And the hairdryer didn't work at all. So by seven thirty AM I was already feeling rather like I was in the bermuda triangle, and somewhere in one of the seven circles of hell.
The instructions they had given me the night before were that I should repack my bags and leave them in the "ite" and when I got a real room in the East Tower (between twelve and three pm) they would take the responsibility of moving my belongings. So I was essentially homeless for several hours that day, and only had what I had removed from my luggage to take with me.
This was just my own personal trials. Our shipper had lost a total of 50 boxes needed for the meeting - boxes that were supposed to be delivered by Wednesday - Thursday at the latest. Thirty nine were equipment Cisco donated the use of, and thirteen of which were *registration* equipment. Being in charge of registration, I was not a happy camper. Ten of the thirteen have since been delivered, but one of the missing three hold my new laptop. So I am still using my old laptop, with my new one in shipping limbo. We are never using this shipper again. The thirty-nine boxes are lost between Fresno and San Diego. How do you lose an entire pallat? We are still trying to figure that one out.
So we have contingency plans on top of contingency plans. Oy.
It is now Saturday, and I've had one really good night's sleep, and I am not looking forward to tomorrow when the hordes descend. On the "looking up" side, the weather is truly beautiful and my "real" room - y'know - the one with a bed? is nice and looks out over the marina. I gotta say the unrelenting good weather would get to me after a while.
(Personal TMI aside to Gwen - yes, I got it. It's your fault, you're responsible, it's yoooouuuuuuur fault!)
Riiiiight. I off load my bags a quick as I could and wandered into reception looking for the elevator. I get on the elevator and look for the button for 12 - being the floor I am staying on. No 12. I glance over at the other side panel and see it *has* a 12, so I push it and we're off!
I get to the room feeling grimy and sweaty from hauling my bags around and just looking forward to a quick wash and bed. No bed. They had assured me that while it was a sofa-bed it was currently made up as a bed. It looked remarkably like a sofa to me. So I turn around and go back downstairs (leaving my bags behind). I get back down to the desk to find, yes, an ambulance had pulled up, fire engines were pulled up outside, and the EMTs were IVing someone lying in a knot of people in the private event room just beyong the reception area. I go and talk to the nice lady at reception and she promised me she'd call housekeeping and have the sofa transfigured soon. I told her I was going to the restaurant to eat a late dinner. I had been going ti skip dinner and go straight to bed, but airplane food is so disgusting all I ate was the dinner roll that had the consistency of styrofoam.
So I ate and when I returned to my room (really the "ite" part of a "suite" - or a "parlor") the sofa had indeed been transfigured. I don't care how good it is, a sofa bed is never a comfortable sleeping surface. I think I had a total of four hours sleep. The morning shower was tepid, because while I could get hot water to run in the tub, I could not get it to come out the shower head. And the hairdryer didn't work at all. So by seven thirty AM I was already feeling rather like I was in the bermuda triangle, and somewhere in one of the seven circles of hell.
The instructions they had given me the night before were that I should repack my bags and leave them in the "ite" and when I got a real room in the East Tower (between twelve and three pm) they would take the responsibility of moving my belongings. So I was essentially homeless for several hours that day, and only had what I had removed from my luggage to take with me.
This was just my own personal trials. Our shipper had lost a total of 50 boxes needed for the meeting - boxes that were supposed to be delivered by Wednesday - Thursday at the latest. Thirty nine were equipment Cisco donated the use of, and thirteen of which were *registration* equipment. Being in charge of registration, I was not a happy camper. Ten of the thirteen have since been delivered, but one of the missing three hold my new laptop. So I am still using my old laptop, with my new one in shipping limbo. We are never using this shipper again. The thirty-nine boxes are lost between Fresno and San Diego. How do you lose an entire pallat? We are still trying to figure that one out.
So we have contingency plans on top of contingency plans. Oy.
It is now Saturday, and I've had one really good night's sleep, and I am not looking forward to tomorrow when the hordes descend. On the "looking up" side, the weather is truly beautiful and my "real" room - y'know - the one with a bed? is nice and looks out over the marina. I gotta say the unrelenting good weather would get to me after a while.
(Personal TMI aside to Gwen - yes, I got it. It's your fault, you're responsible, it's yoooouuuuuuur fault!)