Myrtle Beach: Day 1

Well, we had an uneventful flight down, considering the first near-hurricane (Alberto) of the year had just passed through town.

It was a Veterinary (oft pronounced "Vetinary") Conference and I tagged along. Kelly and I arrive at the hotel at 10:00 AM after getting up before the ass-crack of dawn to catch the flight, thinking, wow, we can relax when we get there and enjoy the WHOLE day! That was until the hotel clerks told us they couldn't get us a room until 2:00 at the earliest, no guarantees! All right.... so they tell us we can leave our luggage in "the office". We go to "the office" and there is this nice, large office with the waiting area PACKED FULL of UPS deliveries and other luggage. The two people working at the desks there barely had room to walk around their desks out the door. And of course I'm thinking this is a workers' comp injury waiting to happen, but since I don't know South Carolina WC Law, and I'm on vacation, I don't give a shit. My luggage becomes part of the hazard.

We walk the pier, walk the beach, decide we'll check out the scenery, and grab lunch at the "restaurant". The "restaurant" is nothing more than a high-school cafeteria. No ambience. And no BOOZE. Anywhere. Anywhere at the entire hotel! This scares me.

Now, when we get there, we see masses of Baptist Youth holding bibles and walking around. This scares me more, especially since there is NO BOOZE!

We kill time and eventually head to the exibitors area which was having the "welcome reception". Basically that meant you could look at all the cool equipment with a beer. They had two stations where you could get beer and wine. So I had me a few cold ones while looking at the auto processors and surgitrons (not to be confused with the "orgasmatron" from the movie "Sleeper". You don't just toss the dog in the machine and it does the surgery for you.)

But I digress.

During all this we keep checking back at the hotel. "Sorry, ma'am. Yer room ain't ready yet." They had quite an array of hotel clerks there: The Indian Woman, the wispy black man, the very dark-skinned black woman, the white trash middle aged woman, the 20 something hipster, the all-american ditzy pretty girl. All overseen by the fat, middle-aged, facial haired surly manager who didn't seem to do anything at all.

So we wait in the lobby for our room. And we watch the people, who are mostly Vet types and their spouses and their 9000 children. Each. There is The Loud Talker: "I have to wait in this line? I have a presentation to give! How long is this going to take! I can't believe I have to wait in this line! Well, in the meantime I'll have a pretentious conversation in a really loud voice with the stranger behind me!" Then there is the Really Ugly Butch Vet Tech With The Unfortunate Mullet Who Is Here With Her Look-Alike Mother". 'Nuff said. The Tall Woman With The Really Big Belly Who Nonetheless Wore A Perfectly Pressed, Too-Tight, Tucked In T-Shirt that said "Desparate Horsewives". Note to you: Horse People are whack jobs.

So finally I go up to the clerk and I say....You keep saying that "our" room isn't ready. Have you assigned us a room? Yes, but she can't tell us the number until she actually gives us the keys and officially assigns it. Okay then, are there other rooms available then? Yes, there are! Really? So why the fuck aren't you just assigning us a different room that is READY, I'm thinking. Can you give me another room? Yes, ma'am, I can give you a different room. My NY sensibilities start to boil and I want to say, WTF? Yes, give me the fucking room, moron! Can you see we've been sitting in your tacky lobby for hours asking you if our room is ready???? But Kelly says that in the south they don't talk like that, they say "That'd be just fahn". So I say to the dumbass clerk, Yes, a different room please. That would be just fine. Thank you.

Then Kelly has a few words with the manager. Better her than me. Trust me. They don't take too kindly to Yankees down in those there parts.

So, here we are in our room. Sober. The view is really nice. We unpack, relax. Then we get to go back to the cafeteria for yummy dinner! It has been a loooong day, so we take it easy the rest of the night. We watch game 5 of the Stanley Cup Finals. We make plans for me to procure booze the following day. Then we hit the sack.