Sometimes in life a girl finds herself through no fault of her own in a "hotel" where the doors open right into the parking lot and the ice machine is tucked away under the exterior stairs.
Having recently experienced such a delight, I felt I could do the women who read my column a great service by offering a guide if you will, about what to expect during your stay while also avoiding unwanted disease.
And pregnancy.
Identify the motel as "seedy.
The first clue that your hotel may indeed be minus 4 stars is the signage. I'm not talking about the name of the hotel as much as I am the marketing message either on a lighted sign out front or a big white banner strung across the building.
If you notice your hotel is almost too proud of the fact that they have color TV, mini fridges or air conditioning in MOST rooms, the hotel might be seedy. If you notice any of the letters are backwards or they have used a lower case "o" in place of a zero, your hotel is definitely seedy.
The check in.
Upon entering the hotel, you'll be greeted by a young woman who looks terribly surprised. Don't be confused. She's not really surprised. She's just taken care to shave off the eyebrows Jesus gave her and draw on brand new ones that arch almost up to her hair line. It's my belief that she probably changes their shape according to her mood, but I'd need to do further research to be sure.
After filling out the coffee stained card she hands you that asks for your home address and the pin number to your bank account, she'll give you a big smile while handing you the key card that LUCKY YOU is also a coupon for 10% off a pizza. It's important not to stare directly at her no matter how prominently that one giant tooth is pushed out in front of the others. Staring at a seedy hotel clerk is like teasing a chained Pit Bull. Next thing you know you'll be at the ER having a giant gold tooth extracted from your nose.
The room.
The good news is walking from your car to your room takes only 1.5 steps. The bad news is walking from your car to your room takes only 1.5 steps. That's why you shouldn't be surprised when upon opening the door you are greeted by the strong scent of exhaust and Aqua Velva. Take heart though. Once your eyes stop burning and they are able to focus again, the bed spreads on the 2 - that's two - more than one and less than three beds, will shock your system so much, you temporarily lose your sense of smell.
Picture a crazy combination of giant flowers colored in faded blue, mauve, green and cigarette smoke. Now take a moment to remember how you felt that one time you drank tequila all night and then went to Denny's for an omelet and then woke up on the bathroom floor with your arm around the base of the toilet with someone else's pants on wondering how it was possible to eat an entire Grand Slam without actually digesting any of it.
Given a choice of looking at these bedspreads and going back in time to puking green peppers through your nose, you would choose the latter without any hesitation.
But wait! There's more!
On the wall, no more than three feet away from the TV, you'll be happy to know you'll have your very own iron and ironing board. Well not yours really as the hotel will have taken great care to make sure you know it belongs to them. In black Sharpie, on the iron itself, they will have written "Days Inn!!!Room 117!!!" only "days" is not capitalized, but "Inn" is. You may ask yourself if that stain on the ironing board could be because someone tried to iron while also eating a peanut butter cup.
Don't.
The bathroom.
If you've ever wondered what it would be like to pee while fixing yourself a nice drink in a plastic cup AND putting your feet up on the bed, you're about to live the dream. That's because at the seedy hotel, they delight in making sure they cram all the necessities in life into as small a space as possible. The toilet is seperated from the bathtub by approximately 3 inches and is located "bed adjacent".
Don't worry if you forget any toilitries though. You'll be excited to know they've left a tiny paper wrapped bar of soap for your use that smells slightly better than your room but not as good as your dog's ass.
Oh! I almost forgot! If you see anything lying on the bathroom floor that you cannot readily identify from a distance, don't pick it up for closer examination. Just go ahead and tell yourself somewhere there is an amputee spider that met a terrible fate on the bathroom floor.
The remote.
This final advice is really important. Before you pick up the remote that is roughly the size of your microwave, please do whatever necessary to locate some Clorox Wipes and clean it up completely. In the absence of Clorox Wipes, just leave it where it is and watch Gilligan's Island in your head.
The Surgeon General has determined the remote in a seedy hotel is literally teeming with sperm. He found that men who sleep in seedy motels often are recently released inmates who are easily aroused by the sight of a prominent tooth and typically release their pent up, shall we say, urges. It's for this reason you also should not touch the in room fridge, the light switches or the smoke detector.
If you should accidentally touch any of these things, for God's sake wash your hands before scratching your nose or rubbing your eyes. That's where Nadya Suleman went wrong.
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A big thank you goes out to my following homies for helping me survive my adventure into seedy hotel land. To Ryland - for offering crafty things I could do with a marker and meth buying ettiquette; to Eric - for telling me funny stories that he thought would make me feel like it wasn't so bad where I was (but it was); to the Evil ER - for offering to sing me to sleep. May all your travels be happy and your hotels have interior doors.
Copyright © Sherri Bailey
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