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This week in CS Land…and note, this is my longest post ever. So long, I actually had to type it up in Word day by day to remember it all, and relieve the stress at the same time. It got up to 15 pages in Word…exactly what I’d predicted it would before Thursday when everything went to hell.
Drunk
We close out the pool every night at 10pm…this includes the hot tub and sauna, which are in the same area, and we do this so they can all be cleaned. We re-open them at 6am. There are also some very specific rules that we have posted in multiple areas in the health club, and they are the basics: No running, no lifeguard on duty, no unattended children under this age, and finally: NO ALCOHOL and NO GLASS ITEMS ALLOWED.
One of my guys goes up to close the pool, and encounters his SC, she’s drunk, and gets pissed that she can’t have her alcohol in a GLASS right next to the pool. She sits down and says “I’m not leaving, my company spends so much money here, I’ll leave when I damn well please!” So I get called up.
I walk up…and I’m immediately in a bad mood, so I just summarize everything for her.
Me: Ma’am, we need you to leave the pool now as it’s closed; we also do have posted rules, neither alcohol nor glass containers of any kind are allowed in the pool area.
SC: I’m not leaving! We spend a lot of money here, and I’ll swim…AND DRINK…where and when I please!
Me: Your choice ma’am, you can leave now on your own, or we can call someone to make you leave.
I used to be so nice…but it worked.
The weekend from hell…
This is going to be the meat of this post, since this weekend is one of the worst groups that we get each year. Imagine about 1,000 screaming drama class teenagers with a group of useless, asshat, EW chaperones, and annoying, nasal-voiced EW parents. Yeah.
I’ll break this down day by day.
Thursday, Day 1
I’ll admit right away that I was very pissy to begin with on Thursday…I had gotten about 3.5 hours of sleep during the day, and I was virtually exhausted before my shift began, much less during the shift itself. This did not make what promised to be a long night any shorter. The fact that Friday and Saturday are going to be just as bad more or less cemented my bad mood within moments of me waking up to get ready for work. And thus, it begins.
Repeaters
Me: Excuse me, folks.
Idiot Teens (almost in unison): Excuse me folks.
Me: (Kill. Destroy. Burn!) It’s past your group’s curfew time, it’s time to go back to your rooms.
IT’s: It’s past your group’s curfew time, it’s time to go back to your rooms.
Me: Cute. It’s 10 degrees outside, if you’d prefer that…we can just go get your luggage and you can spent the night out there. Any questions?
IT’s:
Hi kids, did you notice that Uncle Khiras doesn’t find your little repeating game to be very entertaining? I thought I noticed you noticing.
Noise, and EW Round #1
With this many kids in the hotel, noise is not an “if”, it’s a “when.” First call comes from a room about noise in the hallway, and there’s no mystery here. Sure enough, I walk onto the floor and get to spend 15 minutes telling about 30 teenagers to go into their bedrooms, and shut the hell up. I’m in the middle of this when their chaperone shows up (where the hell she was before this, I don’t know…I assume she was drinking at the bar or prostituting herself. It seemed likely at the time).
SC: Excuse me!
Me: Yes?
SC: What do you think you’re doing!?
Me: We’re asking the children to return to their rooms due to the level of noise, we’re receiving complaints.
SC: THERE’S NO NOISE HERE!
Me: Ma’am, I’m going to ask you to lower your voice in the hallway.
SC: You have NO RIGHT to come here and THREATEN THESE CHILDREN!
Me:
We’ve made no threats ma’am…only asked them to return to their rooms and keep the noise down. I’m going to ask again that you do the same, it is after midnight, and thus it’s too late to have this kind of noise.
I’ll note here that, despite my fatigue, I was talking in a low voice. This is not just because of my infinite patience…it’s also because my voice gets lower the angrier I get. This woman is pushing her luck.
SC: I’LL HAVE YOUR HEAD ON A STICK FOR COMING NEAR THESE CHILDREN YOU BASTARD!
This woman has pushed her luck.
Me: I take it you won’t be lowering your voice then, ma’am?
SC: I WILL DO WHAT I DAMN WELL PLEASE!
Me: (shrug) Very well. (On radio) Security to Denver Police, could you please join me on the <floor>?
I proceed to ignore this WONDERFUL woman by absently drawing a game of Tic-Tac-Toe on the back of my hand, and beating myself until the police arrive from downstairs…did I mention that they came in an extra day to help deal with the kiddies?
Things end rather quickly after that…she tries to order them away twice (at full volume), then gets vulgar…then begs them when she ends up in handcuffs. The final part of their conversation is almost word for word, and her (much better behaved) kids were watching…it was beautiful.
Police: I’m going to make this clear, because I have better things to do tonight than listen to your shrieking all night, so listen closely. You are acting dumber than a 10-year old, and it’s making you look pathetic. Now, are you done, which means you’re going into your room to shut up and stop screaming for the night? Or do we have to call the president of your group and explain to him why his chaperone, his so-called “responsible adult”, is going to jail tonight?
SC: (shakes head)
Police: What does that mean, don’t just shake your head. Are you going to sleep, or are you going to jail? If you don’t answer me one or the other, I’m choosing for you.
SC: S..s….s….sleep…
Police: Good decision.
Too bad for her, one of the kids called someone above her…and the president of the group got to see the ending and get the whole story from the police afterward. I think she’s fallen from favor…
Noise #2
Kid: Are we really that loud?
No, you’re not loud at all. Maybe the fact that I can actually see items on your counter vibrating from the force of the bass would be a hint, or maybe the fact that you actually are almost screaming to be able to talk to me would get the idea across. I imagine that, if you were an actual human, such things might have been obvious within moments. There must be some code among whatever reptilian swamp sow society you spawned from, however, that prevents you from understanding the fact that “I can hear your room from the other end of the hallway” also translates to “yes, you’re fucking loud.”
If this little girl is an indication of our future, I do believe ritual suicide is an appropriate response to avoid said future.
Noise #3
Kid from #2 turns off their music/TV, and I immediately hear running footsteps on the floor above me. Come out onto the floor, and there’s a brand new hell there for me: only about 10 kids this time, running all over, and I appear to have gotten there just in time: one of them has a fire extinguisher in hand. The pin is pulled. The nozzle is aimed directly at another kid. The person holding it then turns, stunned…and points the nozzle at my face.
I may not be Bruce Lee, but I can move pretty damned quick when I need to…and needless to say, I somehow got there, re-aimed the nozzle, and got the damn thing out of his hands before he could spray anything. I was only “upset”…until I turned around.
Their chaperone was standing right there, watching, as if nothing was wrong.
Me: Sir…these children need to be in their rooms. Now. Then, you and I need to have words.
The above was said through grit teeth with about 98% of the blood in my body rushing to my head…Uncle Khiras has just been catapulted past the “upset” stage again. The kids are put into their rooms, and I’ve calmed down just barely enough not to open our “words” with the words “you douchebag.”
Me: Nothing happened this time, but let me make this clear…if this fire extinguisher had gone off, it would have triggered the fire system. The fire department comes here, and they see a fire alarm intentionally triggered because someone screwed around. In short: if I find a fire extinguisher discharged on this floor, the only people here are from your group, and Denver Fire charges quite a large amount for false alarms. Who’s going to pay that bill?
SC: Er…uhm…
Me: I’ll give you a clue: Not the hotel. Your job is to keep control of these children; running in the hallways and playing with our emergency equipment is the exact opposite. Are we going to have this problem again?
SC: Uhm…no…sorry.
Me: (sigh…the sorry has deflated me a bit. He seemed so depressed…)
I did apologize a bit for being so mean
Only a little though…but I swear, if the fire alarm goes off on that floor, I’ll have their heads.
The Pool Jackass
This happened before the noise started rolling in…as I’ve said before, our pool closes at 10pm for cleaning and such. We’re also watching it very closely because this group has destroyed our pool and hot tub in past years. Last year was a nightmare, so we’re not playing with the closing times at all…once it’s closed, there’s no arguments. Well, tonight, someone wanted to make one.
Me: Excuse me folks, the pool and hot tub areas are closing down for the night, we’ll be re-opening at 6am.
SC: But we just got here a half hour ago.
Me: Sorry sir, the pool hours are clearly posted in several areas. For your protection, we cannot allow you to swim while we treat the water with chemicals, and we must close this area.
SC: No way, we’re not leaving! This is our kids’ week, and they can stay as long as they want…we’re paying for our rooms, so you can’t just decide to override us.
Me: Sorry sir, but this is not open to discussion. The health of your children is at risk if they remain here, so everyone must leave the pool area at this time.
(Quick note…this is a fib. We do treat the pool, but the chemicals wouldn’t really do much harm. That said, if the Powers-That-Be say close the pool at 10, we close the pool at 10. )
SC: I don’t think you heard me boy! (grabs my suit coat) I said we’re not leaving!
Me: (Nice guy mode off) You now have two choices. One, you leave, now, and you release me, now. Two, you don’t leave, you don’t let go, and you find out just how quickly the police can get here to take you with them. My guess is about 30 seconds.
SC: What did you just s-
My reaction is not a nice one when someone grabs me…especially on my coat, which is the single dumbest thing you could ever do to someone. That said, when he looked behind me and saw one of my guys, plus an engineer with a wrench in hand, he suddenly realized that he’d made a bad move. He let go before I did something bad…
He left after that, and I started to consider taking up smoking as a hobby…it seemed like it would improve my mood, but I decided against it. This night was going bad enough as is.
You would think someone would learn…
This is more of a Morons in Management rant, but I’m on a roll, and it applies to this weekend, so meh. We have a room that’s listed as having 2 double beds. It does not have 2 double beds. It has 1 double bed. This has been listed wrong since we opened, but no one will just fix it.
This bites me in the ass when 2 people get the room, get pissed that we only have 1 bed in there, then they get pissed when…hell, we’re out of rollaways! YES! JUST WHAT I WANTED TO HEAR!!!
So I get to be verbally dismembered for a while. Awesome. Thanks guys.
Well…I’m awake now
This isn’t one of my SCs, but I thought I’d post it since it contributed to my mood I was woken up during the day by someone knocking on my door…I ignored it, and was almost back to sleep, when I heard my significant other on the phone. He works from home, and gets a lot of callers that are unhappy, so he tends to hit mute and yell at them. I usually don’t notice, but he left the door open and I kept hearing it from the bedroom until I finally got up and closed the doors. This is more or less what I heard, and it makes me laugh in hindsight.
SO: Listen to me you ass!
SO: (something garbled, can’t hear…he’s actually talking to the person)
SO: Answer the question, dickhead!
SO: Sure, read me the riot act…
SO: (garble garble garble)
SO: Your existence is a goddamned HOOKER!!!
He finished up without further comments after that…but it was a great comment Unfortunately, listening to it all woke me up enough that I couldn’t sleep, which is why I was so exhausted all night L.
Friday, Day 2
So, we’re only 1 day in, and now things get worse. In addition to our people from Thursday, we now have a worse issue…there’s a giant parade in downtown on both Friday and Saturday, and it goes right next to the hotel both night. This means we’re going to have thousands of revelers, many of them drunk, just hovering around us. This makes me particularly antsy, because I do not enjoy being surrounded by that many people…there is too much temptation for them to be stupid. As expected, things went…poorly.
Don’t argue with me
Many hotels have policies about recording video on our properties, probably because of anal-retentiveness mostly, but also because there’s a privacy issue…normal guests don’t want to be recorded by some other group during their stay. Now, as previously mentioned, there are tons of minors in the hotel…so when we see someone hovering around them that we’ve never seen before, recording them from afar…we (myself and another manager…with police nearby) approach him.
Me: Excuse me sir, can I talk to you for a minute?
Cameraman (CM): Uhm…yeah?
Me: I need to ask what you’re doing tonight.
CM: I’m just recording the group.
Me: I see…do you have a permit, or a contact with the group who can confirm this?
CM: Er…I’m with a company…he would’ve called them, not me.
Me: Do you have any paperwork to show you’re supposed to be doing that here?
CM: What’s the big deal?
Me: The deal is that we have an unknown person recording minors from a distance where he may not be noticed, and we have no record you’re supposed to be here.
CM: I was hired by the group!
Me: Then I suggest we go about proving this quickly…our job is to protect those kids that you’re recording. The two police over there are being diplomatic enough to let us be the ones who talk to you first, but make no mistake, if we can’t confirm that you belong here, and that there’s nothing amiss about you recording a group of teenagers…how do you think that looks?
CM: Er…I can…uh…call someone?
Me: I highly recommend that.
He spends a while on the phone, and we manage to hunt down the head of the group, who almost digs this guy a new grave when he doesn’t recognize him (the CM went at that). The guy finally presents a card for the business, and everything smoothed over…but CM damn near found himself in jail because the group head didn’t tell anyone he paid a company to come in. We then had to give the head of the group the stern rules: no shooting at other guests not with the group, no shooting in guest rooms without prior permission, and absolutely no recording of hotel employees or police officers without approval from the general manager and that employee. I love when groups try to hide stuff from us.
Congratulations, you win the observance award
Guest: Is there an elevator to get to the floors anywhere?
Me: (Looks at the giant sign 10 feet away that says “ELEVATORS”)
Guest: Oh…damn.
Well…at least he sounded crestfallen enough to realize he was an idiot.
That kid…
Three parter…we are standing guard making sure that no one creepy goes into the dance party for the teenagers. There’s also an adult holiday party for a company on the same floor, opposite side, so we’re keeping the kids away from them.
So what’s the first thing we see? Some teenagers…the fruits of our near future…playing tag on the escalators. What are we, 5!? IDIOTS!!! GET OFF!!!
…is back…
I get called away from my post…I go back…what’s there? MORE KIDS!! AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!! GET OFF!!!!!
…on the escalator again!!!
To quote Brodie…
“Listen, not a year goes by, not a year, that I don't hear about some escalator accident involving some bastard kid which could have easily been avoided had some parent--I don't care which one--but some parent conditioned him to fear and respect that escalator!”
I couldn’t have put it better myself. What is wrong with people?
Chaperone idiocy
Chaperone: Excuse me, can I ask a question?
Me: (Don’t be a smartass, don’t be a smartass, don’t be a smartass…) You mean a second one? (Damn)
Chap.: Ha ha. Is there any room for the chaperones to hang around outside of the dance?
Me: Not really, they didn’t contract one…just the dance rooms.
Chap.: Oh…are there any open bars?
Me: ……
Let’s finish this equation: You are a so-called responsible adult overseeing a group of teenaged kids, most of which are far dumber than they think they are (we all were as teens). You are going to accept that responsibility by going to a bar and getting shitfaced? That means you are:
A) A douchebag
B) A fucktard
C) A jackass
D) All of the above
There are no wrong answers, class. Turn in your tests at the end of the period.
Noise, drunk, assholes, all in one!
One of my people and another manager go up and give a noise warning to a room…we’ve been asked to tip-toe around them as much as possible since they were already angry, and they thought a meeting planner (read: potential business) was in the room. They issue the first warning, and the other manager is told “You’re wrong, we don’t have to stop.” The guests inside literally say “I refuse, the noise is fine.” I disagree, but I wasn’t there for that one.
We get a second complaint, and I’ve now heard some interesting information…one, I heard the above story. Two, I found out the meeting planner they were afraid of isn’t even on that floor, much less in the room. Three, I’ve reaffirmed that I am a generally hateful person, so I have absolutely no morality issues when it comes to ruining someone’s life/party/Christmas/New Years. So, this time, our off-duty police friends come upstairs with us.
The people inside try everything:
“We weren’t making any noise.” (Then how come we can hear you down the hall?)
“We contracted this whole floor for a party.” (Then how come other guests are here?)
“We contracted this room as a party room.” (No, you bought the room as a sleeping room.)
“The hotel is just discriminating against us because we complained earlier about something else.” (No, I’m discriminating against you because you’re annoying.)
We leave them with the unmistakable impression that any more noise will get them kicked out, and we leave. After we leave, the other manager tells me something wonderful…the meeting planner associated with them, the one that they say is going to ask for a full refund the next day, and will get us all fired? That same meeting planner USED to have a room across the hall from them. That same meeting planner literally told the front desk, “I don’t want to be anywhere NEAR their room, those idiots are insane…don’t let them be noisy at all on our account.”
I laughed.
Aww, thanks!
Yes, thank you so much ma’am. Thank you for coming to our hotel, thank you for stopping in to your company’s holiday party. Thank you for drinking tons of alcohol. And thank you for puking all over the nice carpet by our front desk, then leaving to get driven home by your husband.
Thank you SO MUCH, we enjoyed having to clean it up. By the way, alcohol and what appeared to be 12 jars of olives? They mix badly.
Bad choice, huh kiddies?
Our engineer for the night was working on the hot tub, which is outdoors…he happens to look up, and lo and behold, he sees kids lighting up smokes in a room that’s no smoking, and mentioned it to me.
I probably could’ve ignored it, but again, I was in a bad mood. Also, I’m a vindictive, hateful kind of person sometimes, and I take a sinister pleasure in petty revenge against the people who annoy me.
That said, the chaperone was most disappointed in his kids when I had him come with me to bust them…especially since they weren’t smoking cigarettes Oops!
Yeah, I’m bad, I know…but at least I admit it.
Fine, I didn’t like you much anyway
SC: Is there a manager!?
CW: Er, yes, right there! (I’m walking by…and now I’m cursing to myself at doing so)
Me: Yes ma’am, can I help you?
SC: This is the FOURTH time I’ve had to get NEW KEYS for my DAMN ROOM! I’ve been doing this since 4pm!!!
Me: I’m sorry ma’am, we can take care of this… (front desk checks and her keys were de-magnetized) …I am sorry, something must have de-magnetized the key, but they’re fixed now. Do you have any kind of cell phone, or anything magnetic with the key? That can affect it.
SC: NO!!! (empties out her purse) THIS IS EVERYTHING I HAVE WITH ME!
Me: (notes a cell phone and magnetic money clip…bites tongue though) Alright ma’am, well I do apologize. Would you like help with getting everything back in your purse?
SC: NO!!!
Me: O…kay then, would you like me to come with you just to make sure the key words, and you can get back into your room ok?
SC: No! I don’t want your company. (storms off)
Me: Eh, fuck you too then.
CWs:
Sleeping…
This is more of a Cursing at Co-Workers, but I did a management one above too Please don’t kill me Raps!
We’re calling one of our engineers for about a half hour…a guest is having an issue in the room, and it’s not something I can help with, and he’s the only engineer. For 30 minutes we’re calling him on the radio, and after about 10 I start a search for him in case he’s laying hurt/dead somewhere. Mid-search, I get to be the one who finds him…tucked back in an office, asleep. So asleep that, when I wake him up, he starts babbling gibberish over and over for a few minutes, making me wonder if he’s on drugs.
I’m still not entirely sure what I’m going to do to him as I type this…it’s the sort of thing that we fire people for, sleeping on the job. He’s a good guy, and a good engineer, but I’m also not just going to close my eyes for liking the guy. Maybe I’ll update some day with what I decided to do…but maybe not. Tough choice, either way. Criticize all you like I don’t have to feel good about getting someone fired, so I’m going to agonize about it for a while either way L
HA! I don’t think so.
It’s surprising, but today was only the first time someone tried to pull the “I gave you $20!” scam with me. Too bad for him I surf CS a lot…
Sure enough, I pull the person’s drawer, count it twice…and oops, his drawer actually somehow was under after 3 purchases, which is weird, but the would-be scammer got nothing. SO SOWWY!!!
Uncle Khiras laughs loudly at your attempt to get a few easy bucks from us.
Key Bitch
This was my last call before I went home for the day, woman comes to the front desk and says her key isn’t working, and wasn’t working last night either. I’m escorting her upstairs since she has no ID, and on the way find out she’s not registered to the room. Long story short, we argue for about 10 minutes and I finally convince her that what I’ve been saying all along is that we just have to verify she’s supposed to be in the room, since she said items inside have her name on them.
She fails to tell me during this entire time that her entire class of teenagers is already inside, and the doors are propped open. We get there, she tries her key, and…it works. We never re-made it. Her last words?
SC: Well, I guess you’re useless up here since this works, thanks for nothing.
God damnit, screw you straight to hell you maggot infested harpy. Did you actually understand the concept of trying your key in the door before you bitched and moaned about it, or did you need a witness to verify through whatever religious commitment you have that you are indeed a whore? There are plenty of happy religions in the world, yet you apparently chose the only one with a commandment that starts with “Thou shalt be a mental wasteland to thy fellows.” Get out of my home.
Saturday, the last day
I got some great news and some bad news when I came in tonight.
Great news: I was misinformed, most of the teenagers left after I went home
Bad news: They were replaced by guests paying low rates, and drunk football fans. L
It started early.
Medical
I walk in the door tonight and immediately found out an emergency call just started; paramedics are on the way, since someone’s having seizures in a room. We’re fairly well practiced with emergencies, so I stay out from underfoot and go to help escort paramedics up to the room. I do that…and then the Fire Department shows up (they’re also required to respond for medical emergencies here). So, I start calling the person who’s running our elevator to come pick them up…and get no answer. 5 of us start trying to call, no answer.
Bastard turned off his radio for some ungodly reason. Almost went a little psycho there, but he’s still breathing…for now. I hate when people do things like that…
The instructions are right there…
SC: I was stuck in your elevator! I demand a manager RIGHT NOW!
Me: I’m one of the managers on duty, what happened?
Other Guest (OG): Sir, the elevator wasn’t stuck…she didn’t swipe her key.
SC: You shut up! That elevator was stuck with me on it, I was TERRIFIED!!!
OG: Fine…you don’t want to admit that you didn’t read the signs that say to swipe your key, go for it, but we used the elevator just fine after we got on.
SC: (Glare)
Me: Ma’am? How about I ride up with you and make sure you don’t get stuck again…I can understand you might be a little uncomfortable with them just now, and it’ll give us a chance to talk. (slow wink at OG while SC isn’t looking)
She wasn’t too bad, she just refused to admit that she was oblivious. Props to OG though, I was giggling on the inside
Drunk
Me: I’m sorry sir, we can’t allow outside alcohol in the hotel.
SC: FUCK YOU!
Me: And I’m going to have to ask you to watch your language, there are children present.
SC: AND I SAID, FUCK YOU! (tries to push past me)
Me: (Stands in the way) It’s your call sir…you can leave the alcohol outside the hotel, or I can come to your room with our friendly police officers and they can take it from there.
SC: (drops the cases of beer, raises one fist) YOU’RE A DEAD MAN, BITCH!
Police: (standing right behind him, grabs him instantly) Hi!
I’d always wondered if more arrests would go better if the first words that someone said were “Hi”. I got the answer to that question tonight, seeing as SC’s next words will “I’LL KILL YOU ALL!”
If there is any confusion, let me clarify immediately there he did not, in fact, kill us all. He’s cooling his heels in a Denver prison right about now, and my vindictive self is laughing on the inside. Tra-la-la.
Drunk
We close out the pool every night at 10pm…this includes the hot tub and sauna, which are in the same area, and we do this so they can all be cleaned. We re-open them at 6am. There are also some very specific rules that we have posted in multiple areas in the health club, and they are the basics: No running, no lifeguard on duty, no unattended children under this age, and finally: NO ALCOHOL and NO GLASS ITEMS ALLOWED.
One of my guys goes up to close the pool, and encounters his SC, she’s drunk, and gets pissed that she can’t have her alcohol in a GLASS right next to the pool. She sits down and says “I’m not leaving, my company spends so much money here, I’ll leave when I damn well please!” So I get called up.
I walk up…and I’m immediately in a bad mood, so I just summarize everything for her.
Me: Ma’am, we need you to leave the pool now as it’s closed; we also do have posted rules, neither alcohol nor glass containers of any kind are allowed in the pool area.
SC: I’m not leaving! We spend a lot of money here, and I’ll swim…AND DRINK…where and when I please!
Me: Your choice ma’am, you can leave now on your own, or we can call someone to make you leave.
I used to be so nice…but it worked.
The weekend from hell…
This is going to be the meat of this post, since this weekend is one of the worst groups that we get each year. Imagine about 1,000 screaming drama class teenagers with a group of useless, asshat, EW chaperones, and annoying, nasal-voiced EW parents. Yeah.
I’ll break this down day by day.
Thursday, Day 1
I’ll admit right away that I was very pissy to begin with on Thursday…I had gotten about 3.5 hours of sleep during the day, and I was virtually exhausted before my shift began, much less during the shift itself. This did not make what promised to be a long night any shorter. The fact that Friday and Saturday are going to be just as bad more or less cemented my bad mood within moments of me waking up to get ready for work. And thus, it begins.
Repeaters
Me: Excuse me, folks.
Idiot Teens (almost in unison): Excuse me folks.
Me: (Kill. Destroy. Burn!) It’s past your group’s curfew time, it’s time to go back to your rooms.
IT’s: It’s past your group’s curfew time, it’s time to go back to your rooms.
Me: Cute. It’s 10 degrees outside, if you’d prefer that…we can just go get your luggage and you can spent the night out there. Any questions?
IT’s:
Hi kids, did you notice that Uncle Khiras doesn’t find your little repeating game to be very entertaining? I thought I noticed you noticing.
Noise, and EW Round #1
With this many kids in the hotel, noise is not an “if”, it’s a “when.” First call comes from a room about noise in the hallway, and there’s no mystery here. Sure enough, I walk onto the floor and get to spend 15 minutes telling about 30 teenagers to go into their bedrooms, and shut the hell up. I’m in the middle of this when their chaperone shows up (where the hell she was before this, I don’t know…I assume she was drinking at the bar or prostituting herself. It seemed likely at the time).
SC: Excuse me!
Me: Yes?
SC: What do you think you’re doing!?
Me: We’re asking the children to return to their rooms due to the level of noise, we’re receiving complaints.
SC: THERE’S NO NOISE HERE!
Me: Ma’am, I’m going to ask you to lower your voice in the hallway.
SC: You have NO RIGHT to come here and THREATEN THESE CHILDREN!
Me:
We’ve made no threats ma’am…only asked them to return to their rooms and keep the noise down. I’m going to ask again that you do the same, it is after midnight, and thus it’s too late to have this kind of noise.I’ll note here that, despite my fatigue, I was talking in a low voice. This is not just because of my infinite patience…it’s also because my voice gets lower the angrier I get. This woman is pushing her luck.
SC: I’LL HAVE YOUR HEAD ON A STICK FOR COMING NEAR THESE CHILDREN YOU BASTARD!
This woman has pushed her luck.
Me: I take it you won’t be lowering your voice then, ma’am?
SC: I WILL DO WHAT I DAMN WELL PLEASE!
Me: (shrug) Very well. (On radio) Security to Denver Police, could you please join me on the <floor>?
I proceed to ignore this WONDERFUL woman by absently drawing a game of Tic-Tac-Toe on the back of my hand, and beating myself until the police arrive from downstairs…did I mention that they came in an extra day to help deal with the kiddies?
Things end rather quickly after that…she tries to order them away twice (at full volume), then gets vulgar…then begs them when she ends up in handcuffs. The final part of their conversation is almost word for word, and her (much better behaved) kids were watching…it was beautiful.Police: I’m going to make this clear, because I have better things to do tonight than listen to your shrieking all night, so listen closely. You are acting dumber than a 10-year old, and it’s making you look pathetic. Now, are you done, which means you’re going into your room to shut up and stop screaming for the night? Or do we have to call the president of your group and explain to him why his chaperone, his so-called “responsible adult”, is going to jail tonight?
SC: (shakes head)
Police: What does that mean, don’t just shake your head. Are you going to sleep, or are you going to jail? If you don’t answer me one or the other, I’m choosing for you.
SC: S..s….s….sleep…
Police: Good decision.
Too bad for her, one of the kids called someone above her…and the president of the group got to see the ending and get the whole story from the police afterward. I think she’s fallen from favor…
Noise #2
Kid: Are we really that loud?
No, you’re not loud at all. Maybe the fact that I can actually see items on your counter vibrating from the force of the bass would be a hint, or maybe the fact that you actually are almost screaming to be able to talk to me would get the idea across. I imagine that, if you were an actual human, such things might have been obvious within moments. There must be some code among whatever reptilian swamp sow society you spawned from, however, that prevents you from understanding the fact that “I can hear your room from the other end of the hallway” also translates to “yes, you’re fucking loud.”
If this little girl is an indication of our future, I do believe ritual suicide is an appropriate response to avoid said future.
Noise #3
Kid from #2 turns off their music/TV, and I immediately hear running footsteps on the floor above me. Come out onto the floor, and there’s a brand new hell there for me: only about 10 kids this time, running all over, and I appear to have gotten there just in time: one of them has a fire extinguisher in hand. The pin is pulled. The nozzle is aimed directly at another kid. The person holding it then turns, stunned…and points the nozzle at my face.
I may not be Bruce Lee, but I can move pretty damned quick when I need to…and needless to say, I somehow got there, re-aimed the nozzle, and got the damn thing out of his hands before he could spray anything. I was only “upset”…until I turned around.
Their chaperone was standing right there, watching, as if nothing was wrong.
Me: Sir…these children need to be in their rooms. Now. Then, you and I need to have words.
The above was said through grit teeth with about 98% of the blood in my body rushing to my head…Uncle Khiras has just been catapulted past the “upset” stage again. The kids are put into their rooms, and I’ve calmed down just barely enough not to open our “words” with the words “you douchebag.”
Me: Nothing happened this time, but let me make this clear…if this fire extinguisher had gone off, it would have triggered the fire system. The fire department comes here, and they see a fire alarm intentionally triggered because someone screwed around. In short: if I find a fire extinguisher discharged on this floor, the only people here are from your group, and Denver Fire charges quite a large amount for false alarms. Who’s going to pay that bill?
SC: Er…uhm…
Me: I’ll give you a clue: Not the hotel. Your job is to keep control of these children; running in the hallways and playing with our emergency equipment is the exact opposite. Are we going to have this problem again?
SC: Uhm…no…sorry.
Me: (sigh…the sorry has deflated me a bit. He seemed so depressed…)
I did apologize a bit for being so mean
Only a little though…but I swear, if the fire alarm goes off on that floor, I’ll have their heads.The Pool Jackass
This happened before the noise started rolling in…as I’ve said before, our pool closes at 10pm for cleaning and such. We’re also watching it very closely because this group has destroyed our pool and hot tub in past years. Last year was a nightmare, so we’re not playing with the closing times at all…once it’s closed, there’s no arguments. Well, tonight, someone wanted to make one.
Me: Excuse me folks, the pool and hot tub areas are closing down for the night, we’ll be re-opening at 6am.
SC: But we just got here a half hour ago.
Me: Sorry sir, the pool hours are clearly posted in several areas. For your protection, we cannot allow you to swim while we treat the water with chemicals, and we must close this area.
SC: No way, we’re not leaving! This is our kids’ week, and they can stay as long as they want…we’re paying for our rooms, so you can’t just decide to override us.
Me: Sorry sir, but this is not open to discussion. The health of your children is at risk if they remain here, so everyone must leave the pool area at this time.
(Quick note…this is a fib. We do treat the pool, but the chemicals wouldn’t really do much harm. That said, if the Powers-That-Be say close the pool at 10, we close the pool at 10.
)SC: I don’t think you heard me boy! (grabs my suit coat) I said we’re not leaving!
Me: (Nice guy mode off) You now have two choices. One, you leave, now, and you release me, now. Two, you don’t leave, you don’t let go, and you find out just how quickly the police can get here to take you with them. My guess is about 30 seconds.
SC: What did you just s-
My reaction is not a nice one when someone grabs me…especially on my coat, which is the single dumbest thing you could ever do to someone. That said, when he looked behind me and saw one of my guys, plus an engineer with a wrench in hand, he suddenly realized that he’d made a bad move. He let go before I did something bad…
He left after that, and I started to consider taking up smoking as a hobby…it seemed like it would improve my mood, but I decided against it. This night was going bad enough as is.
You would think someone would learn…
This is more of a Morons in Management rant, but I’m on a roll, and it applies to this weekend, so meh. We have a room that’s listed as having 2 double beds. It does not have 2 double beds. It has 1 double bed. This has been listed wrong since we opened, but no one will just fix it.
This bites me in the ass when 2 people get the room, get pissed that we only have 1 bed in there, then they get pissed when…hell, we’re out of rollaways! YES! JUST WHAT I WANTED TO HEAR!!!
So I get to be verbally dismembered for a while. Awesome. Thanks guys.
Well…I’m awake now
This isn’t one of my SCs, but I thought I’d post it since it contributed to my mood
I was woken up during the day by someone knocking on my door…I ignored it, and was almost back to sleep, when I heard my significant other on the phone. He works from home, and gets a lot of callers that are unhappy, so he tends to hit mute and yell at them. I usually don’t notice, but he left the door open and I kept hearing it from the bedroom until I finally got up and closed the doors. This is more or less what I heard, and it makes me laugh in hindsight. SO: Listen to me you ass!
SO: (something garbled, can’t hear…he’s actually talking to the person)
SO: Answer the question, dickhead!
SO: Sure, read me the riot act…
SO: (garble garble garble)
SO: Your existence is a goddamned HOOKER!!!
He finished up without further comments after that…but it was a great comment
Unfortunately, listening to it all woke me up enough that I couldn’t sleep, which is why I was so exhausted all night L.Friday, Day 2
So, we’re only 1 day in, and now things get worse. In addition to our people from Thursday, we now have a worse issue…there’s a giant parade in downtown on both Friday and Saturday, and it goes right next to the hotel both night. This means we’re going to have thousands of revelers, many of them drunk, just hovering around us. This makes me particularly antsy, because I do not enjoy being surrounded by that many people…there is too much temptation for them to be stupid. As expected, things went…poorly.
Don’t argue with me
Many hotels have policies about recording video on our properties, probably because of anal-retentiveness mostly, but also because there’s a privacy issue…normal guests don’t want to be recorded by some other group during their stay. Now, as previously mentioned, there are tons of minors in the hotel…so when we see someone hovering around them that we’ve never seen before, recording them from afar…we (myself and another manager…with police nearby) approach him.
Me: Excuse me sir, can I talk to you for a minute?
Cameraman (CM): Uhm…yeah?
Me: I need to ask what you’re doing tonight.
CM: I’m just recording the group.
Me: I see…do you have a permit, or a contact with the group who can confirm this?
CM: Er…I’m with a company…he would’ve called them, not me.
Me: Do you have any paperwork to show you’re supposed to be doing that here?
CM: What’s the big deal?
Me: The deal is that we have an unknown person recording minors from a distance where he may not be noticed, and we have no record you’re supposed to be here.
CM: I was hired by the group!
Me: Then I suggest we go about proving this quickly…our job is to protect those kids that you’re recording. The two police over there are being diplomatic enough to let us be the ones who talk to you first, but make no mistake, if we can’t confirm that you belong here, and that there’s nothing amiss about you recording a group of teenagers…how do you think that looks?
CM: Er…I can…uh…call someone?
Me: I highly recommend that.
He spends a while on the phone, and we manage to hunt down the head of the group, who almost digs this guy a new grave when he doesn’t recognize him (the CM went
at that). The guy finally presents a card for the business, and everything smoothed over…but CM damn near found himself in jail because the group head didn’t tell anyone he paid a company to come in. We then had to give the head of the group the stern rules: no shooting at other guests not with the group, no shooting in guest rooms without prior permission, and absolutely no recording of hotel employees or police officers without approval from the general manager and that employee. I love when groups try to hide stuff from us.Congratulations, you win the observance award
Guest: Is there an elevator to get to the floors anywhere?
Me: (Looks at the giant sign 10 feet away that says “ELEVATORS”)
Guest: Oh…damn.
Well…at least he sounded crestfallen enough to realize he was an idiot.
That kid…
Three parter…we are standing guard making sure that no one creepy goes into the dance party for the teenagers. There’s also an adult holiday party for a company on the same floor, opposite side, so we’re keeping the kids away from them.
So what’s the first thing we see? Some teenagers…the fruits of our near future…playing tag on the escalators. What are we, 5!? IDIOTS!!! GET OFF!!!
…is back…
I get called away from my post…I go back…what’s there? MORE KIDS!! AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!! GET OFF!!!!!
…on the escalator again!!!
To quote Brodie…
“Listen, not a year goes by, not a year, that I don't hear about some escalator accident involving some bastard kid which could have easily been avoided had some parent--I don't care which one--but some parent conditioned him to fear and respect that escalator!”
I couldn’t have put it better myself. What is wrong with people?
Chaperone idiocy
Chaperone: Excuse me, can I ask a question?
Me: (Don’t be a smartass, don’t be a smartass, don’t be a smartass…) You mean a second one? (Damn)
Chap.: Ha ha. Is there any room for the chaperones to hang around outside of the dance?
Me: Not really, they didn’t contract one…just the dance rooms.
Chap.: Oh…are there any open bars?
Me: ……
Let’s finish this equation: You are a so-called responsible adult overseeing a group of teenaged kids, most of which are far dumber than they think they are (we all were as teens). You are going to accept that responsibility by going to a bar and getting shitfaced? That means you are:
A) A douchebag
B) A fucktard
C) A jackass
D) All of the above
There are no wrong answers, class. Turn in your tests at the end of the period.
Noise, drunk, assholes, all in one!
One of my people and another manager go up and give a noise warning to a room…we’ve been asked to tip-toe around them as much as possible since they were already angry, and they thought a meeting planner (read: potential business) was in the room. They issue the first warning, and the other manager is told “You’re wrong, we don’t have to stop.” The guests inside literally say “I refuse, the noise is fine.” I disagree, but I wasn’t there for that one.
We get a second complaint, and I’ve now heard some interesting information…one, I heard the above story. Two, I found out the meeting planner they were afraid of isn’t even on that floor, much less in the room. Three, I’ve reaffirmed that I am a generally hateful person, so I have absolutely no morality issues when it comes to ruining someone’s life/party/Christmas/New Years. So, this time, our off-duty police friends come upstairs with us.
The people inside try everything:
“We weren’t making any noise.” (Then how come we can hear you down the hall?)
“We contracted this whole floor for a party.” (Then how come other guests are here?)
“We contracted this room as a party room.” (No, you bought the room as a sleeping room.)
“The hotel is just discriminating against us because we complained earlier about something else.” (No, I’m discriminating against you because you’re annoying.)
We leave them with the unmistakable impression that any more noise will get them kicked out, and we leave. After we leave, the other manager tells me something wonderful…the meeting planner associated with them, the one that they say is going to ask for a full refund the next day, and will get us all fired? That same meeting planner USED to have a room across the hall from them. That same meeting planner literally told the front desk, “I don’t want to be anywhere NEAR their room, those idiots are insane…don’t let them be noisy at all on our account.”
I laughed.
Aww, thanks!
Yes, thank you so much ma’am. Thank you for coming to our hotel, thank you for stopping in to your company’s holiday party. Thank you for drinking tons of alcohol. And thank you for puking all over the nice carpet by our front desk, then leaving to get driven home by your husband.
Thank you SO MUCH, we enjoyed having to clean it up. By the way, alcohol and what appeared to be 12 jars of olives? They mix badly.
Bad choice, huh kiddies?
Our engineer for the night was working on the hot tub, which is outdoors…he happens to look up, and lo and behold, he sees kids lighting up smokes in a room that’s no smoking, and mentioned it to me.
I probably could’ve ignored it, but again, I was in a bad mood. Also, I’m a vindictive, hateful kind of person sometimes, and I take a sinister pleasure in petty revenge against the people who annoy me.
That said, the chaperone was most disappointed in his kids when I had him come with me to bust them…especially since they weren’t smoking cigarettes
Oops!Yeah, I’m bad, I know…but at least I admit it.
Fine, I didn’t like you much anyway
SC: Is there a manager!?
CW: Er, yes, right there! (I’m walking by…and now I’m cursing to myself at doing so)
Me: Yes ma’am, can I help you?
SC: This is the FOURTH time I’ve had to get NEW KEYS for my DAMN ROOM! I’ve been doing this since 4pm!!!
Me: I’m sorry ma’am, we can take care of this… (front desk checks and her keys were de-magnetized) …I am sorry, something must have de-magnetized the key, but they’re fixed now. Do you have any kind of cell phone, or anything magnetic with the key? That can affect it.
SC: NO!!! (empties out her purse) THIS IS EVERYTHING I HAVE WITH ME!
Me: (notes a cell phone and magnetic money clip…bites tongue though) Alright ma’am, well I do apologize. Would you like help with getting everything back in your purse?
SC: NO!!!
Me: O…kay then, would you like me to come with you just to make sure the key words, and you can get back into your room ok?
SC: No! I don’t want your company. (storms off)
Me: Eh, fuck you too then.
CWs:
Sleeping…
This is more of a Cursing at Co-Workers, but I did a management one above too
Please don’t kill me Raps!We’re calling one of our engineers for about a half hour…a guest is having an issue in the room, and it’s not something I can help with, and he’s the only engineer. For 30 minutes we’re calling him on the radio, and after about 10 I start a search for him in case he’s laying hurt/dead somewhere. Mid-search, I get to be the one who finds him…tucked back in an office, asleep. So asleep that, when I wake him up, he starts babbling gibberish over and over for a few minutes, making me wonder if he’s on drugs.
I’m still not entirely sure what I’m going to do to him as I type this…it’s the sort of thing that we fire people for, sleeping on the job. He’s a good guy, and a good engineer, but I’m also not just going to close my eyes for liking the guy. Maybe I’ll update some day with what I decided to do…but maybe not. Tough choice, either way. Criticize all you like
I don’t have to feel good about getting someone fired, so I’m going to agonize about it for a while either way LHA! I don’t think so.
It’s surprising, but today was only the first time someone tried to pull the “I gave you $20!” scam with me. Too bad for him I surf CS a lot…
Sure enough, I pull the person’s drawer, count it twice…and oops, his drawer actually somehow was under after 3 purchases, which is weird, but the would-be scammer got nothing. SO SOWWY!!!
Uncle Khiras laughs loudly at your attempt to get a few easy bucks from us.
Key Bitch
This was my last call before I went home for the day, woman comes to the front desk and says her key isn’t working, and wasn’t working last night either. I’m escorting her upstairs since she has no ID, and on the way find out she’s not registered to the room. Long story short, we argue for about 10 minutes and I finally convince her that what I’ve been saying all along is that we just have to verify she’s supposed to be in the room, since she said items inside have her name on them.
She fails to tell me during this entire time that her entire class of teenagers is already inside, and the doors are propped open.
We get there, she tries her key, and…it works. We never re-made it. Her last words?SC: Well, I guess you’re useless up here since this works, thanks for nothing.
God damnit, screw you straight to hell you maggot infested harpy. Did you actually understand the concept of trying your key in the door before you bitched and moaned about it, or did you need a witness to verify through whatever religious commitment you have that you are indeed a whore? There are plenty of happy religions in the world, yet you apparently chose the only one with a commandment that starts with “Thou shalt be a mental wasteland to thy fellows.” Get out of my home.
Saturday, the last day
I got some great news and some bad news when I came in tonight.
Great news: I was misinformed, most of the teenagers left after I went home
Bad news: They were replaced by guests paying low rates, and drunk football fans. L
It started early.
Medical
I walk in the door tonight and immediately found out an emergency call just started; paramedics are on the way, since someone’s having seizures in a room. We’re fairly well practiced with emergencies, so I stay out from underfoot and go to help escort paramedics up to the room. I do that…and then the Fire Department shows up (they’re also required to respond for medical emergencies here). So, I start calling the person who’s running our elevator to come pick them up…and get no answer. 5 of us start trying to call, no answer.
Bastard turned off his radio for some ungodly reason. Almost went a little psycho there, but he’s still breathing…for now.
I hate when people do things like that…The instructions are right there…
SC: I was stuck in your elevator! I demand a manager RIGHT NOW!
Me: I’m one of the managers on duty, what happened?
Other Guest (OG): Sir, the elevator wasn’t stuck…she didn’t swipe her key.
SC: You shut up! That elevator was stuck with me on it, I was TERRIFIED!!!
OG: Fine…you don’t want to admit that you didn’t read the signs that say to swipe your key, go for it, but we used the elevator just fine after we got on.
SC: (Glare)
Me: Ma’am? How about I ride up with you and make sure you don’t get stuck again…I can understand you might be a little uncomfortable with them just now, and it’ll give us a chance to talk. (slow wink at OG while SC isn’t looking)
She wasn’t too bad, she just refused to admit that she was oblivious. Props to OG though, I was giggling on the inside
Drunk
Me: I’m sorry sir, we can’t allow outside alcohol in the hotel.
SC: FUCK YOU!
Me: And I’m going to have to ask you to watch your language, there are children present.
SC: AND I SAID, FUCK YOU! (tries to push past me)
Me: (Stands in the way) It’s your call sir…you can leave the alcohol outside the hotel, or I can come to your room with our friendly police officers and they can take it from there.
SC: (drops the cases of beer, raises one fist) YOU’RE A DEAD MAN, BITCH!
Police: (standing right behind him, grabs him instantly) Hi!
I’d always wondered if more arrests would go better if the first words that someone said were “Hi”. I got the answer to that question tonight, seeing as SC’s next words will “I’LL KILL YOU ALL!”
If there is any confusion, let me clarify immediately there he did not, in fact, kill us all. He’s cooling his heels in a Denver prison right about now, and my vindictive self is laughing on the inside. Tra-la-la.
can you share the SO... PLEASE 
)
Thanks for the early morning laugh, i needed it.. 
Except maybe that I love that you're a manager with a backbone. 
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