Yesterday, as I walked through the door to clock in for work, I was informed that the business and property had been sold, and that we were going to be closing our doors tomorrow at noon.
I wish I could say it was more of a shock, but the truth is, business has been dreadfully slow for a long time now. What was a shock is that they gave us 2 days notice that we wouldn't have a job anymore. It really shouldn't have come as a ssurprise, since nothing the owners have ever done could ever be described as "even slightly giving a fuck about their employees"... still it couldn't have come at a worse possible time. The property manager is promising us he will get all of us placed at other properties, but I am pessimistic.
I just spent close to a grand getting my car fixed, I just got health insurance for the first time in 20 years for 135 a month, my brother is going to have to cut back on hours because he is trying to get on disability (his epilepsy is getting worse). but all that is beside the point, you don't read these posts because you want to be depressed, you read them because they offer a glimpse into the bizarre and sordid world of the hotel...
And, as always, there is wierd and unseemly to tell. A weeks ago, after staying with us for a month without incident other than being annoying shits, a married couple got into a heated dispute... and by dispute I mean she is a junkie, and he is a redneck piece of shit, and they tried to kill each other... on the balcony... with the lead pipe...
I wasn't there to witness the kerfuffle myself, but I know it ended with her screaming and apparently suffering a head wound, one which bled... a lot... The police were called, whereupon they locked themselves in the room. The police, believing it was an action movie, broke out the window with a flashlight, and dove through with guns pulled and ready like overweight commandoes. He was taken to jail, she was taken to the hospital, and they were informed they would have to pay for the window before they were allowed back in for their belongings. Ah there belongings... the room was not only full of shit, all worthless crap, but they had actually put up shelves and brought in a cabinet...clothes, nicknacks, drug paraphenalia, a stereo (not a boom box, and actual stereo), food... fuck the food... all of which has been left in the room... to fester... I had to go up there to turn off lights last night, and the smell... it was like... cheese and death... deathcheese if you will... Like testicle sweat hatefully scraped from a 1800 mountain man who liked to get it on with goat corpses...
Then there was the creep... I got to evict them 2 days ago. Look, I try to keep an open mind, I try to be sensitive. I am aware of the difficulties and trauma a transgendered individual has to deal with. None of that changes the fact that this was the single creepiest person I have ever met. In the first place, this person could not decide what gender they were, and insisted the front desk refer to him as him or her, depending on what he or she was wearing...
And this persons idea of transition was to buy two bright blue bouncy balls at Walmart, stuff them in a bra, and then wear a shirt that openly revealed her bright blue rubber cleavage to anyone who even glanced in that direction. The rest of his outfit consisted of heels so ridiculous a professional drag performer would call too tacky, a red pleather miniskirt which was so short you could see the man tighty used to be whities but were a perpetual grey and brown stained nightmare and a 10 dollar wig that looked like it had missed the dumpster after halloween and for a time had been used a nest by rodents with bad taste. He worked at the restaurant next door, where they only knew him as male, or at least thats what he or she, depending on time of day and which direction the wind was blowing wanted to believe. The truth of the matter is, everyone he worked with knew, because several of our guests ate their daily. But still... non of that is actually creepy. A little sad maybe, to see an individual so confused about their identity, and likely suffering from a host of mental problems on top of it.
What made him or her so creepy, and what led to his eviction, was the fact that he liked to lurk in the breezeway, a small hallway at the center of the building where the stairs are, completely enclosed. Its well lit, but he or she would sit under the stairs, in both identities, and stare at people as they went by. Trying to engage the women in uncomfortable topics of conversation, and hitting on the men... I gave him/her 2 warnings, I told them if I got one more complaint that he would be out, immediately, no refunds and forfeiting the deposit. What came next was horrific on a brain bleach scale... once again he was lurking in the breezeway, this time in nothing but those dirty underwear, the bra with the bright blue bouncies, and the wig... and when a family, with two small children, went by, he exposed himself to them... which got the police called immediately....
The worst part was, his father, who didn't seem to have any idea about any of this, was called in to clear out the room. His father was a pleasant, friendly man, who knew his kid has some issues, but clearly had no idea what he was walking into. According to the housekeepers, the state of the room was horrendous, and it was filled with sex toys, and letters written to himself describing some pretty sick stuff. The look on his fathers face as he left the room, with trash bags filled with the guests things was one of abject humiliation and despair. It broke my heart... we wnated to remove the more incriminating things from the room, but hotel policy and state law forbids us from doing that. All in all it was heartbreaking.
On the positive side, I had a regular guest, a nurse who lives a bit out of town and stays with us when she is on call at the local hospital, bring me a pie when she found out the hotel was closing... I have had phonecalls from some of the other guests with whom we had built a rapport. The monring woman/kinda manager has spent the last two days phoning all our regulars, especially the ones for big events who book rooms a year in advence, letting them know whats happenned and getting them reservations at other hotels in the area, making sure their rates would be honored.
So the hotel wasn't all nightmares and oddities. And I will miss this place. I will miss the building itself, it was a great hotel, it just needed work the owners were never willing to spend money on. I will miss the guests, the pleasant ones I always looked forward to, and the crazy ones who made my life interesting. I will miss the free time my job provided. Mostly I will miss the crew I worked with, we were a very close knit group who always had each others back and kept interpersonal drama to an absolute minimum.
If I do get on at another hotel, these missives will of course continue, but if not... its been a long strange trip.
And man, I really hate the idea of having to get a job where I actually have to work...
by Wisdom000 » Thu Mar 29, 2012 7:32 pm 
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