Yesterday morning I arrived at the hotel to find my Bell Captain trying to deal with an unruly customer who was obviously drunk. The guest was in his thirties, had a black smudge the size of a thumb-print on his nose, and spoke with an Irish—or maybe Scottish—accent.
"Tyge, talk to this guy. He might like you better than me," Captain Rachael said as she walked away.
Because his brogue was slurred, I had to listen carefully in order to understand what he was saying.
"My room number is 8004 and I can't find where it is."
"We don't have a room 8004," I said.
"That's what the lass said! I'm telling you, I'm on the 8th floor, in room fook'n 8004!"
"What tower are you staying in? I can probably figure-out your room number if you know what tower you're in."
"That's what she said too! I don't know what fook'n tower I'm staying in!"
"Did she try to look your name up in the computer?"
The bloke was getting frustrated.
"Aye, I'm apparently not in your fook'n computer."
"Well, don't you have your hotel I.D. card, or the check-in booklet?"
I literally saw lightbulbs in his eyes. He reached into his pocket and pulled-out a crumpled-up pamphlet. As he opened it, his room key was tucked inside the slit in the pamphlet—just like it should be—and the room number was hand-written (by the check-in clerk) in the appropriate spot—again, as it should be.
"You see! Room 8-0 fook'n 0-4!"
"You're right sir,” I said pointing to the pamphlet, “but your room is next door at the Bellagio. Is that where you're staying?"
"Holy shite and shining glory," he said.
I smiled, gave him a pat on the shoulder, and pushed my cart across the casino floor toward the service elevator. The guy wasn't through with me yet though, and was walking next to me.
"That's still no fook'n excuse for your boss to treat me like shite! She was fook'n rude!"
"I'm sure she did what she could, but you did seem a little rowdy when I first walked-up to the desk."
"Aye, she was being a fook'n bitch though. No excuse for that."
My patience was wearing thin.
"You're going the wrong way to get back to your hotel," I said, “and you got some crap on your nose."
"Well, fook! Now you can shut your fook'n arse too," he said.
I stopped pushing my cart and looked at him.
"You know what?" I said, "We're done now. I don't get paid enough to listen to people like you."
"Well you just go and push your fook'n cart and deliver your fook'n luggage," he said.
"Oh, I will," I said as I turned down a private hallway.
In a moment of brief clarity, the drunk realized he still needed to find the proper way out of the hotel so that he could get back to his room.
"Look," he yelled, "could you just please tell me how to get back to the fook'n Bellagio?"
I stopped, parked my cart, turned around, and walked up to him.
"Just follow this concourse into the shopping mall," I said pointing past our nightclub. "When the mall divides at the big water fountains, take the right hall—and that will take you outside to The Strip. From there, immediately get on the people-mover (aka covered escalator) to your left, and that will take you directly into your hotel."
"God bless, mate," he said as he walked toward the shopping mall.
For the rest of my shift I had a wry smile on my face because I was thinking about the pitiful bloke, the smudge on his nose, and how the people at The Mirage were probably telling him how to find his way back to the Bellagio.
FiN.
