Like that song from Daniel Powter, I had one of those days I would soon forget. I like to think that I’m reasonably stable as far as temperament goes, but the crap, literally and figuratively that I had to deal with has made me very angry indeed.
It all started last night when I received a letter from a credit union that has the loan on the camper informing me the February payment is late. This morning I texted my wife to see what he deal was. Her reply was in the form of a question mark followed by “It was paid.”
She then went on a tangent about wanting more money for her mom and that she was sick. Then she said that if I didn’t believe her call the bank; not easy for me to do at work. I replied that the letter was dated February 12th. I then told her as long as it was for her mother, fine. The implication more than clear, as she replied that I was pissing her off. And I said that makes two of us.
She ranted some more but I had to clock in and didn’t have time to respond.
I’m at work now, doing the hotel back of house where I normally am. I go to one of the restroom areas and discover someone had smoked there. Most normal people, I would think, if there were no available ashtrays, that no smoking is the rule of thumb. But apparently common sense at a hotel/casino is not required. There were cigarette ash everywhere on the carpeted floor, which I dutifully vacuumed up.
Then I’m walking over to the lobby area and look outside where I see cigarette butt on the ground behind a butt disposal. I go outside to investigate and find that someone opened the back door, dumped all the butts from an inside tin can and apparently took the cigarettes they wanted and left the rest for me to clean up. I did of course, then I go to the other restroom area. Just outside is a smokers’ area with the same type of butt disposal unit, and I wanted to make sure it wasn’t tampered with too. It wasn’t, but…
On the entry mat by the door was a pile of dog crap. Apparently one of our wonderful guests thought it a good idea to take their Fido or Bowser for a duty walk but thought he needed a cigarette break too. The dog apparently was in no mood to wait around for ignorant master to finish his smoke and proceeded to unleash on the entry mat, an overabundance of fecal matter just in front of the doorway. SHHH, don’t tell anyone.
I called my supervisor on this just so that she could see for herself why I was angrily telling I needed help with taking care of this problem. No sooner did I call her than someone in maintenance called about a bio issue in the team member restroom downstairs. Obviously, I couldn’t very well stop what I was doing and take care of that problem. Another male housekeeper was tasked for that fun job. He told me it was delightful in a most ironic tone.
Two mats were removed and one was replaced, I cleaned out and threw away the doggy mess and went downstairs hoping that was the end of that problem. It wasn’t. Again, dummy me goes outside to the other smoking area just outside what is called the Spa area. Once again butts are strewn about just outside the butt disposal unit, its back door opened and the tin can out and up-side-down next to someone’s frozen vomit. Obviously that mess would have to thaw out first before I or anyone else could or would clean it up.
I was in a dark humor for the rest of the day, venting out my frustration to anyone who dared listen to my rant. I guess I must chalk this whole experience to how we are a culture have to deal with the ignorance of others, from the adle-minded druggy who thinks it must be okay to smoke anywhere, to an autocratic dictator who decides he can invade his neighbor and feel he can get away with it because he is Vladimir Putin. Hopefully sanctions alone will make him change his mind but I doubt it. The only answer for someone like that is what eventually happened to Saddam Hussain and Muammar al-Qaddafi.
Jerry Schellhammer 