34: A Bum's Life

It’s not that I mind waking up in jail with a hangover - no honestly, things could be worse - but when the charges are read and I‘m found guilty, I really want to really be guilty. Not innocent, otherwise it’s all so sadly unfair.

Work finished at 5.00pm. Winter was drawing to a close and the first hint of spring had sparkled through the window all afternoon and my friends suggested a drink across the street at the Louisville Inn, a hotel bar where the waitresses wore silk, split-to-the-thigh trousers and tops revealing a level of femininity that made up for the beer.

My first mistake was deciding to drive home to change first. The second, closely related, was in not showering at the same time. In 1982 and, being British, the idea of optionally taking a shower on a day that was not Sunday, was unthinkable.

If I hadn’t gone home, I wouldn’t have left my wallet on the table. If I’d had a shower, perhaps the cops, when they later pulled me over for what began as speeding, might not have seen the greasy hair and stubbled chin and decided that I should be removed from the road. But I digress…

I drove my silver Firebird - oh yes, a car that stood out - at high speed back downtown and joined the crew in the bar. All was as expected - the sexy waitresses were there, the guys were there and the beer flowed. Discovering the non-wallet situation, the guys subbed me. When happy hour finished, the waitresses let it be known they were off to Dukes - a local hotspot - in case we might like to join them. We might.

I’d only been in town a few weeks and didn’t know my way around, so I followed Graham - who had a V8 Transam but didn’t appreciate newbies who couldn’t keep up. He drove fast and disappeared into the night after a few miles and then it started snowing. The blue flashing lights appeared in my mirror almost at the same time that I realized I was hopelessly lost, so I pulled over and waited, hoping I could get directions and go on my way.

The trooper approached and demanded my license and insurance. Both were in my wallet, which was at home. I tried to explain about the girls and how important it was that I should get to Dukes. He was a man, I thought - he’d understand.

He asked how much I’d had to drink but I continued about the girls, unabated. Is it known as withholding, I wonder, when you avoid a question like that? Perhaps it was my accent. Perhaps it was my stubble. Perhaps it was the greasy hair standing up at every angle known to man. Or perhaps it was the smell of the beer.

He asked me back to his police car. Whilst I sat in the back as he wrote out tickets and spoke in a hillbilly voice over the radio, a wrecker truck came and towed away the Firebird. Then we drove to the precinct house, which is the quaint American term for police station. Thinking that humor would diffuse the situation, when we walked inside, I pointed out that he hadn’t even handcuffed me, so he changed that immediately. They really aren’t that comfortable.

He stayed whilst a kindly old man, who looked as though he’d me more at home teaching maths to bored students, set up the breathalyzer. I’d expected a blow-in-the-bag affair, but this was like a desk outfitted with tubes, with dials and buttons and a chemical tube that had to be primed. When it was all ready, I blew through a tube that was almost three feet long and needles sprang to life. My reading, he said, was ‘borderline’, which surprised me as I was the only one of the three of us that knew I’d consumed five rounds of beers at two-for-one. You do the math.

Once I’d been charged and allowed my single phone call - I called work and left a message saying I’d be late in the morning - I was locked in a cell. The trooper disappeared and I was left to get what sleep I could, with only a mattress thinner than cardboard between my hips and a steel bunk. Several times in the night, I awoke with my contacts glued to my eyeballs and developed the solution of pulling the hairs up my nose to make my eyes water. Breakfast in the morning was pancakes and coffee - for free. Not enough syrup though - this was no Denny’s.

I was duly charged with driving without a license (in the wallet), without insurance (in the wallet), no license plates (new car and dealership temporary plate had expired), DUI (drunk driving), speeding and reckless driving. It was explained that I should get a lawyer to ‘negotiate’ some of these, since I professed to having a license and insurance, that the lack of license plates was not my fault and that speeding and reckless driving were mutually exclusive and that the DUI was ‘borderline. There was one other item though, that couldn’t be negotiated away…

The desk clerk asked me how much money I had on my person. None. I had to sign a form stating that I had none. It was explained that, in Bullit County, all persons must carry at least three dollars in cash. No exceptions. I began to explain again about the wallet. No exceptions, the clerk repeated, interrupting me. It was not a laughing matter.

He was right. Seven weeks later, in court, I was fined and given 6 points on my license for speeding and all other offences were dismissed. Except one. Even the judge protested to the police, but his hands were tied.

So that is why, despite being in possession of an expensive sports car when arrested and subsequently having earned millions of dollars over the years, I still have an outstanding conviction on the state of Kentucky.

For VAGRANCY.

33: A Munch and a Sip

It's late, I'm hungry and tired.

Thirty miles on the bike from Wilmington to Southport has made my wrist painful and the hangover from last night's Special IPA in the Wilmington brewery has done the same to my head. All I want is plenty of water, several glasses of wine and some nice food. Doesn't have to be fancy, just has to be OK. Could be Cabernet with red meat, could be Chardonnay with seafood - I don't much care, but the combination is everything my abused body requires to get back on the right track.

Slainte, the local Irish pub, is so close to the motel I could spit and hit its door but I don't want Irish food. They'd murder anything like a steak, the only fish would be battered and deep-fried and I'm not in the mood for chicken wings or any of the so-called traditional Irish favorites like bangers and mash, corned beef and cabbage or shepherd's pie; not tonight.

The Surfer's Paradise is half a mile away and I head there, past the low-grade fast food joints and walking on the sandy grass against traffic, all of which wants to kill the pedestrian. It's a game we play, me and the drivers; I act like a normal person and they become homicidal maniacs, intent of mowing down He-Who-Dares-Walk.

It's hot and I get sweaty very fast. All I can think of is red meat and red wine so I guess the reds have it. Burger perhaps? No. Steak. Ribeye? New York Strip? Could be either, but it must be rare and the wine makes it a meal.

When I reach Surfer's, I'm perturbed to see that closing time is 8.00pm - only half an hour away. I had thoughts of staying for several hours, writing notes and ruminating on life and the bike trip. Inside, it looks like a cross between a school dining room from England in 1968 and an old folks' eating house. No cosy booths, no old wood - just plastic-topped tables. Also, it is quiet, except for the sounds of people eating; no music.

I saw a documentary on the TV Food Channel two days ago where the hero of the program found a haute cuisines chef working in the restaurant of a gas station in Texas, so perhaps the room layout I see before me is indicative of the high-class feast to come.

I get a seat and notice the cutlery - every table setting has a single fork, encased in a paper packet. There are no knives. The diners are mostly old - are they not trusted with sharp objects? Does someone on the staff arrive when dinners is served, to cut our food into little squares? Do we get bibs? Is someone on hand to execute the Heimlich manoeuvre should a piece of meat go down the wrong way and bring and early termination to someone's dining experience?

My waitress arrives to tell me her name is Kelly. It should be Fat Kelly, I decide, in a moment of devilry. Fortunately I have enough sense to not pass on my humor. Kelly delivers a menu and asks me what I want to drink, so I tell her it depends on what I'll eat but, in the meantime, I could have a beer so what do they have on tap? That's when my world begins to shatter.

They don't have beer on tap. They don't have beer in a bottle, as I find out a millisecond later. Of course, I could gamble on the steak choice and go straight to the wine selection and order a Cabernet, but that's also not going to happen because Kelly, realizing that I am asking for something well beyond her ability to supply, blurts out, "We don't umm, umm, umm - serve," and I correctly take this to mean that there isn't a drop of booze in the house. Well, not for me - maybe the chef is a complete alky and glugs a bottle of gin whilst he's preparing the grub, but that's not for me to say.

Kelly leaves me with the menu and I decide that I should at least give the place a try because I am pretty hungry but, after scanning all three pages, I am at a loss to find something that is not fried. There are no salads, not that I want one, but their absence is relevant. Finally, I do manage to locate two non-friend items, both of which are steaks. hen I realise that every item - and I mean every item - is accompanied by a superlative adjective.

Both steaks are of generous proportions and would be grilled perfectly to my liking. The pork chops (fried of course) are described as delicious, the fish is gently battered, the scallops are fried to golden perfection. Not a single entry is without such a description and it reminds me of a used car lot where every car sports a placard bearing a similar boast.

Between the superlatives, the atmosphere and lack of alcoholic stimulation, I decide that a burger and a beer in the Irish pub might be the best choice. Maybe they have wine. They'll certainly have knives and, if they don't have Guinness, I'll carve off my own head with one. So, I exit quickly and trudge back up the road, past the gas station that has no shop, past the pizza place, which has now closed, across the parking lot and into Slainte.

They have Guinness, so I order one.

They have music.

I ask the bar guy about food.

"Not until September," he says, scratching the back of his head. "We have no kitchen. There's a place called Surfers about half a mile away..."

32: VIP

Am I a VIP?

Usually, the answer would be no, unless I hold a boarding card or an ID card or an invitation that specifically says that I am.

Several years ago, I was ejected from the British Airways VIP lounge at Heathrow. Even though I held a platinum British Airways VIP credit card, was a member of the British Airways Preferred Travellers Club and held a business class ticket (free upgrade), I was told by a uniformed official - who will one day die under painful and mysterious circumstances - that they did not allow just anyone in.

So, I guess I just don't have VIP stamped on my forehead, a lack that which causes no discomfort, but does explain why it did not occur to me yesterday morning to enter the VIP room on the 9th floor of the Wilmington Hilton for a continental breakfast. The sign clearly said VIP lounge. It could have had a sub clause explaining that anyone with a room on the 9th floor had a silver key - and that a VIP was anyone who held a key of that color.

Did it?

No.

Perhaps it's my status as a computer professional and the required level of precision in the way that I think - or maybe I'm just anal - but I often fail to understand what other people take for granted. I see signs all the time that are ambiguous and could be taken in several ways, or just plain wrong. Walmart has two signs on the same side of their doors. One says "No Entry," and the other, placed right underneath, proclaims, "Enter Only". Every door is the same. What is the intended effect and what moron placed mutually exclusive instructions next to each other?

Anyway, I digress...

This morning, armed with new and empowering knowledge regarding my status in the Hilton hotel, I visited the VIP lounge, expecting to be removed at any moment and wondering whether my Wado-Ru qualification (9th Ku, red belt) would in any way protect me from the wrinkled matron whose job it was to inspect keys.

I needn't have worried.

Either she was closer to death than anyone suspected or simply enjoyed an IQ in single digits. Any interaction caused her to smile in a vague, far off manner and tilt her head slightly to the side, as she murmured to an unseen location in mid-air somewhere beyond my right shoulder. I have no idea what she said, but the sounds could be useful to George Lucas if he were ever to make a sequel to Close Encounters, so I took it to mean "Help yourself to anything you see within these four walls."

It could also have been a warning. She might have been trying to say, "Don't even think you're getting over your hangover in here chum, because I'm about to turn on the giant flat screen TV at full volume and the bozo with the camouflage jacket is going to start an argument with it."

So I left.

I relinquished my VIP status, trudged up the road with my hangover in place and sat outside the Port-O-Java with a real coffee, watching a mad street vagrant doing a Bojangles impersonation in the middle of the road for change flipped into the street by other coffee drinkers.

What a job; limited life expectancy, but easy money.

I bet he doesn't worry about VIP status.

31: Computing For Dummies

So, I am alone and at the mercy of the accommodation jungle. If the map show that my destination has multiple big-name hotels, I wait until I arrive to find one. If it looks like a bed for the night is a rare as bacon in a synagogue, I have to call ahead or - if God has smiled upon me and I find myself blessed by the presence of usable computer facilities - use the Internet.

I find it curious how few facilities are provided, even by expensive hotels. I can understand why the Triangle Whorehouse Motel, where rooms are rented by the hour, doesn't stretch to anymore than clean sheets, multiple towels and air freshener, but I was surprised that the Wilmington Hilton saw fit to charge by the minute for a PC and for every sheet of paper printed.

It's surprising how quickly you can run up a bill as large as the national debt of a small country getting carried away on an email, especially when some girl with a silky sweet voice calls you from Verizon in the middle of it and spends ten bloody minutes of valuable computer time on a discussion regarding the relative benefits of an LG Envy Touch over an iPhone. That's assuming little Jimmie or little Suzy haven't found the business centre and glued themselves to Facebook, where they'll remain until their heads rot.

Even when one is there, it's often the cheapest piece of computing faeces to be found in Best Buy. Sometimes it freezes, sometimes it's as slow as a challenged snail and sometimes the keyboard requires the keys to be pressed as just the right angle and to exactly the right depth, otherwise no character appears on the screen and you spend as much time correcting your prose as writing it.

Then, of course, you can't rely on the software - does it have Word, or just a Word reader? Will you be able to build and edit something offline and then cut 'n' paste it to email or a flashdrive, or do those facilities not exist, so anything you create will be a complete waste of mental points and typing time because you can't get it off the damned machine?

In a Red Roof Inn on the outskirts of Wilmington, I was ecstatic to find what appeared to be a fully functional machine. Internet, email, available USB ports, local printer - all there. Did it have Word? Yes. Heaven was mine - temporarily. Each time I tried access to a 'suspicious' web site, the parental block overlaid the screen and I was advised to seek an administrator. Same thing with an email that might contain a bad word. Similarly with my blog, which contains no bad words but, I suppose, whoever set up that parental blog might worry that the youngsters of today's nanny state might have their emotional growth stunted by accidental exposure to profanity in the form of 'butt' or 'tail'.

Three weeks ago I found a motel in New Paltz that had a PC but it was turned off and locked away in the drawer of the desk where it was mounted. To use it, the desk clerk had to unlock the drawer to set it up then lock it away again - for security, he said. No way to plug a flash drive into that one. Oh well - that was also the motel whose breakfast comprised dry toast, dry cereal and see-thru coffee. Someone asked for butter and the desk clerk professed to have run Out. I asked for jam and he said it would be in tomorrow. Someone else asked for milk for the cereal and he shrugged, eyes cast heavenward, as if the answer would come from there. The whole place could have been the inspiration for Faulty Towers.

Someone call John Cleese.

30: A bridge Too Far

No smiling faces at breakfast.

No rushing to get bags to the luggage truck.

No cue sheets. No SAG van. No mechanical support. No route rap. No Denny's or hotel breakfast - just half an hour in a McDonald’s with the map and phone, trying to find a bed for the night.

It’s now two weeks since finishing the Cross Country ride and I have either 1,800 or 2,300 miles to go, depending on whether I go to Key West or directly to Tampa. The hotel routine hasn't changed much but the days are emptier.

It’s easy to get blasé about the camaraderie when other people are around all the time, but their lack of presence is obvious. Where's the Dalton Gang? Where’s Jim, zooming ahead at the speed of sound? Where's Willie, glued110% of the time to his cellphone before finally looking up, with a dazed expression? The road seems longer these days.

I hoe to see another cyclist in trouble so I can stop to help. Not because I am such a kind and helpful fellow, but because I have accumulated so many unspoken words since the last conversation that I will burst if I don’t spew them out.

I keep hotel desk people far too long when I check in and I always check out in person, just to gt that human touch. The clerk's desire to put the phone down is almost tangible when I call ahead to make a reservation. I don't use the internet for it anymore - it's weird to talk to a computer screen and people start to slide away when I do.

If someone happens to talk to me in a restaurant or bar, they soon regret it. Their eyes glaze as I babble like a Red Bull addict in response to the smallest of acknowledgements. Eventually, I will be interrogating fast-food people about their menu items, their jobs, their day, where they spent their last vacation – anything at all, just to interact with another human.

The subject is irrelevant as long as I hear the sound of myself talking. I don’t care whether anyone listens or whether there is any ebb and flow to the words, I simply have to speak in the presence of another individual. It is verbal masturbation. My feminine side has surfaced.

My mind wanders often on the road, with mile after mile of nothing to do except look ahead and pedal. Another gas station, another turning another tree… Even flat tires are welcome as they give me something to do. Well, that would be the case if it weren't for these damned Bontragers, which seem impervious to punctures.

In the morning, I think about sex. I start combining the best parts of previous girlfriends into one supergirl - mentally, of course, I’m not Frankenstein. I make the best of the best, but then I start to worry. The universe being what it is, with cause and effect and balance etc., if there was one all perfect supergirl, wouldn’t there also have to be one total anti-supergirl. Like the devil’s spawn in a miniskirt? Come to think of it, I believe I dated her.

I stop on bridges; they're my new friends. Some are trestles, some are steel girder affairs that every truck makes rattle and some are simple concrete roadways, but each one deserves a little attention.

So far, I haven’t talked to one (not much, anyway) or flagged down a passing motorist to ask for a photo with my new friend, but it’s just a matter of time. Harrisburg has lots; some for cars, some for trains and some for walking. Maybe I’ll go there for a few days. New friends are always welcome.

Late afternoon, I find myself staring at the computer on the handlebars, watching the hundredths turn into tenths and willing those onward. When a new mile comes around, it’s time for celebration. It’s not the same as another bridge, of course, but what could be?

It’s a long way to Key West. Sometimes, I wonder if I’ll make it all the way without going mad.

Maybe it’s too late.

29: Potty Training

As anyone non-British will discover when they visit the country, electrical sockets are generally installed in the place of greatest inconvenience. Nothing of higher power than a shaver socket is ever to be found in a bathroom lest we accidentally electrocute ourselves by using a hairdryer in the bath and the light switch hangs from a dirt-encrusted string that disappears into a suspicious stalactite on the ceiling.

I was reminded of the way in which we regularly make life difficult for ourselves – whilst pretending that such irks are perfectly normal – in the Boston Hotel Buckminster on Saturday afternoon. Perhaps other rooms are different but, in room 502, the bathroom light switch is cunningly hidden in the bedroom.

Did it matter? Did he lack of light play any part in the drama about to unfold? Let me know…

The luxury of time to perform a light switch search does not exist after sitting in a car for forty-five minutes, not long after a fried breakfast on the morning following the intense celebrations at the end of a three thousand mile bicycle tour, when your bowels are trying to explode. The urgency with which I rushed into the bathroom with a single purpose in mind did not allow the extravagance of appropriating reading materials and so the availability of light was unimportant.

Even the ownership of a new Nick Hornby novel would not be enough to bring a halt to the irrevocable flow of events and I was content to execute and complete the task in the minimal gloom that could filter through the closed wooden bedroom shutters and reach around the bathroom door. Einstein’s observations about light and straight lines do not apply in hotel room situations, particularly in times of personal stress.

Eventually satisfied, I stood and reached behind to press the flush. Something not quite right with the sound of gushing water made me turn to observe. Dismayed, I watched the silhouette of that-which-should-not-be-named rise towards the edge of the bowl and remain perilously close to its rim.

Holding my trousers up with one hand and finally locating the light switch several yards away with the other, my worst fears were confirmed; a blockage. Would it go away? Would there be a long pause, followed by a comforting swoosh as normality returned?

No.

I tried to will the situation better but my powers of telekinesis were insufficient. I glared at the disobedient toilet with the best look of superior British scorn I could muster. I kicked the side of the bowl repeatedly. Nothing changed.

Ben Stiller faced a similar situation in There’s something about Mary and attacked it with an ornamental toilet brush - but I had no toilet brush. Besides, I’m not Ben Stiller and stand no chance whatsoever of shagging Cameron Diaz. Not that the toilet brush incident played any great part in advancing his success on that score (ha ha excuse the pun), but I’m just saying… Oh, never mind.

I tried to ignore the vile, nasty potty in the center of the room. Time to lower the lid on, umm, well, just time to lower the lid. There are more things to do than worry about – that.

The toilet refused to be ignored. I unpacked and went back to the bathroom to check – maybe it’s all better?

No.

I plugged in the laptop, waited the usual Sony eternity for it to boot up and then checked the bathroom again.

Perhaps a small decrease in the level.

Should I try another flush? Too risky. An overflow situation did not bear consideration. Time to take a shower. Maybe another usage of the water system would cause something to occur? Clutching strings is the technical name for thoughts like that.

Problems in the shower with reversed hot and cold water, unmarked and entirely unsqueezble shampoo and conditioner bottles and the usual lack of places to put toiletries paled into insignificance.

The toilet was in control.

Anything could happen. I’ve seen it at the movies – one moment all is fine and the next, the toilet takes on a life of its own, becomes a high-pressure fountain and covers the bathroom ceiling in, well, let’s just say it misbehaves in a very bad way. I couldn’t forget Ben Stiller and the toilet brush.

Several times, I slyly pulled back the shower curtain to make sure nothing disastrous had occurred. The lid was still down. In my mind it had become a living, breathing evil plotting demon from the pit of hell, whose mission was the destruction of a single being; me. I even thrust a tentative step out of the shower, wet and naked, to gingerly lift the lid in the hope that fate had intervened.

It had not.

Nothing had changed by the time I was dressed. What now? I’ve had toilet problems before, but always had the tools available to deal with it. Now, I have not. Then it hit me…

This is a hotel.

Of course! I pay for this room. That’s what hotels are for – blocked toilets and other dramas are part of the room rate. It’s like insurance. Not everyone blocks the toilet, just like not everyone has a car accident or a house fire or a burglary – but we all pay for insurance.

Why am I worried? Why do I care? It’s not even my fault, not really. This isn’t New Jersey, where everyone is a percentage blameworthy for everything.

I don’t live here. It’s not my apartment and it’s not a friend’s home where I’m house-sitting, baby-sitting or dog-sitting. No one knows who I am other than the guest in 502 and I’ll be gone on Monday. It’s not my responsibility – what’s what hotel maintenance people are for. Do I care if they’re Mexicans and have horrible jobs. I began to smile; a plan had formed. The toilet was no longer in control.

I got dressed, picked up the bedside phone and called the front desk. If the phone cord had been longer, I could’ve glared into the bathroom at the same time as I reported it. Bastard toilet; that’ll show it.

On the way out, I even kicked it again; viciously, this time. No psychopathic improvement of Thomas Crapper is going to get the better of me.

28: Avalon

One might be forgiven for thinking that, after two specific hotel tales and several references to the mixed state of accommodations as we pedal our way across the country, all material had been exhausted.

Not so.

Let’s not dwell on the coffee maker with the wrong-sized pot, too small to trip the coffee-release valve so that it overflowed the basket until I poked it with a finger and became drenched in scalding brown lava.

Let’s not whine about the Wooster Best Western breakfast of rubber scrambled eggs, biscuits and bile-like gravy, thin coffee and sausages resembling dog turds or the low quality do-it-yourself freebies provided in a myriad of other hotels that caused many riders to embark on 100 mile days with empty stomachs.

Let’s not mention the numerous hotels where internet connection was inoperable either by wire or wi-fi or those where it connected, only to immediately disconnect at the press of any key.

Let’s not cry about those furniture-challenged rooms where the chair was several inches too small so reaching the laptop keyboard was like trying to eat at the adult’s meal table as a 4 year old.

Let’s ignore all those and concentrate on the Avalon hotel in Erie, Pennsylvania…

After pedaling 52 miles through cold rain, sitting soggily uncomfortable in the SAG van for the remaining 37 and finally reaching the hotel, I’m handed the key to room 724.

I navigate the mop-wielding Mexican in the lobby, slopping sudsy water from a bucket over the already-slick floor in a perpetual state of cleaning. He’s like those painters who work forever on the Golden Gate Bridge because it takes so long to get one coat done that it’s time to start again. You can make a career out of it. They never take the paint off though, so one day it’ll get so heavy it’ll fall down and stump scientists for decades.

Anyway, I digress…

The Avalon was built around the time the Dead Sea scrolls were written and everything above the lobby gives the impression of having not been not upgraded since the Carter administration. As I walk my bike along the seventh floor hallway, my nose is filled with the lingering smell of paint, so it seems that something is happening at last. I don’t particularly mind the pungent odor – it reminds me of my first non-shared apartment; my personal ‘new car smell’.

Being cold and wet, air conditioning is not required, but the room feels like a fridge and the wall unit has no switch to select between heating and cooling. Turning the thermostat from the 50 degrees where it’s currently set, shuts off the A/C fan but does not produce any warmth. Maybe it needs time but, after unpacking and doing laundry, the heat still has not come on, so I call the front desk.

“Turn it to 70,” she says. It’s on the maximum of 85, but I do as I am told in case there’s something magical about the 70-mark. Nothing changes. “Try turning it the other way,” she says, but that switches the air conditioning back on. “Umm, put it back to 70,” she instructs, less confidently. “Wait five minutes and call back if it doesn’t work and I’ll send maintenance.”

This feels like staying home to tough out an illness and then, at death’s door, struggling to the doctor only to be told, “Take two aspirin and come back next week.” I decide to shower first. Options are slim when you’re naked

There’s no shampoo.

The bathroom is equipped with a coffee maker, ice bucket, hair drier, body lotion, soap, two bottles of conditioner and enough towels of varying shapes and sizes to supply a whole village in England, but no shampoo.

I was in my teens before learning that washing my hair with hand soap wasn’t the way to go but my hair is the way you would expect after riding more than fifty miles in the rain, so it seems that I must suffer once more. I’m starting to get what Harry would call ‘arse-ache’ with this hotel and my cold, wet state does nothing to salve it.

The shower has a mind of its own and seems to have lost it. The single water control switches the temperature from scalding to freezing in a one-inch band of movement. It does not vary gradually, but simply changes from one extreme to the other, requiring more luck than skill to find the single sweet spot where the water will neither freeze my private parts nor take my skin off.

The shower height might be suitable for midgets, dwarves and full-sized short people, but I am none of those and have to force the showerhead almost horizontal. Consequently, the water shoots the length of the bath like a jet stream, rebounds from the wall and floods the floor until I aim it at a lower angle – but then I have to stoop to get wet above the waist.

Fifteen minutes later, clean and refreshed but with backache and hair standing up like sexually excited string, I emerge into the hypothermic living room. The heating still doesn’t work. The same girl answers the phone and promises to send maintenance, so I take the opportunity to also ask for shampoo, then get dressed quickly and go out.

Starbucks is a ten minute walk (thank you, God) so I consume as much brown hallucinogenic as possible without passing out and return to the hotel several hours later. The heating still does not work but the presence of a blue bottle of shampoo in the bathroom shows evidence of a visit.

Perhaps repairs are ongoing? The thermostat seems to be in the same position as earlier and there’s no note, so I call the front desk again. A different woman from earlier tells me that repairs are not ongoing and promises to advise maintenance, who will attend to it whilst I am out for dinner. Two hours, one burger and three beers later, I return to find the room still cold.

Perhaps personal attention may make a difference, so I take the elevator back to the lobby and stand at the desk in front of yet another clerk – a man this time – whilst he answers call after call from the switchboard without ever once looking up. It seems that all calls take precedence over physical presence so, with a flash of what can only be described as personal brilliance, I return to the room and use the phone to call him.

I explain the situation, being careful to not let the three beers sway my negotiation. He promises to send maintenance. “Haven’t they already been twice,” I ask, but he does not know. The front desk does not keep records of the comings and goings of the maintenance man, he says.

I cannot stay in the room to wait and I cannot go to bed; so I go out again. Many hours later, after returning from various bars in the area, the heating still does not work.

The cold seems to have dissipated, although that might be imagination brought on by the large amount of beer that I have consumed as a result of being in close proximity to Harry; a quantity that also makes it inadvisable to visit the front desk again. Fortunately, I have enough sense to not do so.

In any case, there is nothing that can be done. I have learned, from talking to other riders in the pub, something that the desk clerks could easily have told me…

The heating is inoperative for the entire hotel.

No rooms have it.

It is off for the summer.