Motel Hell

For Cori, on her birthday...

A little over a year ago, my baby brother, Nathan, and his gorgeous wife, Hope, were married. The wedding itself was beautiful. Stunning, in fact. It was held down in Natchez, MS at a southern plantation called Dunleith.


[Dunleith]

We had the option of staying at Dunleith for the weekend, but they are not fond of young children running amok inside the mansion, what with all of those priceless antiques and knicknacks. Can't say as I blame them; I have seen what Cole can do with scissors, a Sharpie, gorilla glue, and supposedly washable finger paint. Not that those things would be lying around the mansion, but if they were, he has an uncanny ability to sniff them out. He's like McGuyver, able to take seemingly innocuous items, put them together in unique ways, although his purposes are more geared toward destruction, rather than self-preservation.

Needless to say, we didn't stay there. My other, very slightly younger brother, David, found us a place to stay, that was not only economical, but on the internet...looked decent. Not only that, all of my other out of town relatives were staying there, so win/win..right? NOT SO MUCH.

[Front of our motel, obviously taken when it was built, because it sure as hell doesn't look like that now]

Looking at the pictures below, it doesn't really look like the hell-hole it is, right? However, had I spent two seconds reading the reviews on trip-advisor, I would have at least been forewarned. Did I do that? nooo...I did not.

[Internet picture of what our room was supposed to look like]


[Internet picture of what our bathroom was supposed to look like]

Anyway, we arrived at the hell-hole, mid afternoon on the day of the rehearsal dinner. Immediately we saw the sign in front stating that they offered "Free Deluxe Continental Breakfast with Frozen Waffles". I laughed, because I seriously thought it had to be some kind of joke. I mean really?...advertise the fact that you were offering L'eggo My Eggo's on the big sign out front? Like that would be the deal clincher.


Hmm...where to stay? where to stay? Ohhh...THIS PLACE has FREE frozen waffles...that does it for ME! I'm in!!!

We got our room key from the much less than helpful (if not downright rude) desk staff. As soon as we entered the room, Katie, my then 13 year old, asked why we always stayed in dumps? Um...not sure Kate, but it looked good on the internet! Of course, the motel was one of those older kinds in which you access your room from the outside.

We opened the door, and after getting past the initial smell of cigarettes, old people, and fungus, we noticed the room was TINY. The double beds were nearly touching each other, the TV was probably 20 years old, the carpeting was not the kind that you would ever consider walking around in bare feet, the sink was one of those rusted out basin kind with the plumbing exposed, with only a sink and NO counter space; there was a chair available near the TV, and of course...the ever popular Gideon's Bible. No self respecting motel is without one of those! The only thing missing was the chalk outline of the dead body of the previous tenant. Joy.



Entering the tub/toilet area, it was not possible to close the bathroom door, if in fact you were actually sitting on the toilet. Instead, you would have had to stand in the tub, close the door and then you would have had enough room for your feet. Actually, Lloyd still did not have enough room for his legs, he had to sit on the toilet, with one leg in front of him and one leg in the tub. I'm sure that was comfortable. The exhaust fan didn't work and I wasn't the least bit surprised. I happened to read some reviews when we got back and noticed that one person had complained about a bunch of toe-nail clippings near their sink. Toe.Nail.Clippings. *gross*

I was a little nervous about the double beds...Lloyd and I are not really made to sleep in those together. He is big, and I am not tiny by any means. Therefore we had to sleep on our sides, laying in the same direction, and perform synchronized flipping throughout the night, lest one of us fall out and land on the disgusting carpeting.

[Actual picture of our room]


[Actual picture of the "sink area"]

No crappy motel room is complete without the disgusting, rattletrap, leaking, moldy window unit. Lloyd immediately took that apart and set the pieces and parts in the tub for a thorough cleaning with bleach. YES...he has done this before in several crappy motels we have stayed in, so he is a veritable pro at it. And YES...we did bring bleach.

I know that one or two of these problems would have been enough to send some of you packing, but as I said earlier, we have stayed at a crappy motel or two before, and we can tolerate a lot. Or we are just stupid, take your pick.

Anyway, the rehearsal and subsequent dinner at Dunleith went well, and we made our way back to the motel around 11. We noticed that lots of folks weren't actually in their rooms, they had dragged their lowly chair to the balcony landing in front of their rooms and were partying with their friends, family and neighbors. When in Rome (or the ghetto, as it were)...you know. So, we spent an hour or so mingling with our out of town family ghetto style, and headed off to bed for our synchronized swimming sleeping.

[Balcony view...lovely, isn't it?]


The next morning, Katie got up to go and get her continental breakfast, consisting of NOT L'eggo My Eggo waffles, but the generic Walmart Great Value freezer burned waffles. She was already very unimpressed by our choice of motels, and that pretty much just sealed the deal for her that we, as her parents, are cheapskates and we suck.

I had to get dressed to go to the bridesmaids bruncheon at Dunleith, and really couldn't spend a whole lot of time worrying about her overall well being and happiness. I dressed in a button down blouse and khaki shorts that seemed acceptable at the time. Much to my dismay, not only was I the oldest bridesmaid there by nearly 15 years, but I was also horrendously under dressed. I vaguely recalled something on the invitation that said something about wearing a dress, however, I must have ignored that because I only owned two dresses: one that I wore to the rehearsal dinner the night before (purchased earlier that afternoon) and the one that I was wearing in the wedding that day. The other bridesmaids looked refreshed, wearing pretty dresses, with their hair and makeup looking perfect despite the fact that the majority of them had been out partying ALL NIGHT. I could only take solace in the fact that their 26 year old selves would one day be 40+, and looking great would not come so easily to them. Muwahahaha.

Having made it through brunch, somewhat sheepishly, it was now time to start getting ready for the wedding. Lloyd ferried me back to motel hell, and took the kids for lunch at Pizza Hut across the street, so that I would have the whole room to myself to get ready. THIS is when things really went down hill.

I went down to the front desk to see if I could get an iron, as I had not yet ironed my dress. To obtain an iron, in this fine establishment, the following things were required: $10 *cash*, a current drivers license (surrendered through the duration of the iron lease), your first born, 3 references with phone numbers, and a pap smear. Ok, not the last three, but you seriously had to pay for the iron and give them your drivers license. Obviously, that was a little bit too Orwellian for me....not to mention, the ladies at the front desk were just plain mean. I really couldn't understand what they said, although I have lived in the south a relatively long time. It sounded like a ghetto version of the guys from Swamp People.


...so I went back to the room and "attempted" to plug in my garment steamer to allow it to heat up. YES, we had brought the steamer, but I am not terribly good at using it and was really hoping for an iron. It never occurred to me that the room wouldn't have one!

Another thing lacking in motel hell were outlets. There was one behind the ancient chinese secret TV, but getting to it proved to be a b!tch. I tried to move the "entertainment console" however, it was bolted to the wall. I found another outlet behind our nightstand...however, that was also bolted to the wall. I discovered that if I removed the drawer, I was able to successfully plug in the steamer. A lot of work for such a simple thing.

Into the disgusting tiny shower I went, and upon exiting, I noticed that not only had the bathroom taken on a sultry/South American Amazonian type feel, but so had the entire room due to the steamer warming up. Crap, the fan doesn't work. Literally, you could not see 2 feet in front of your face. I half expected to hear the shrill sounds of those weird forest monkeys.


Women are going to understand this next part. It is NOT POSSIBLE to do your hair and put makeup on in 100% humidity. You can try, but I can assure you that any and all makeup is going to slide off of your face and your hair will go one of two ways: dampish poofy frizzy, or limp frizzy. Take your pick. Either way, it's all bad.


I won't lie, I felt slightly panicky then. I had less than 1/2 hour before Lloyd was going to be back, I couldn't put makeup on, I hadn't steamed my dress, and my hair, given the current humidity, was hours a way from thinking about being dry, or it was going to be an afro in minutes. Either way, the options were not looking good. So, I put on a bra and panties, shook an entire bottle of travel sized baby powder between "the girls", slapped a bunch of giant velcro rollers in my wet hair (which if you like to *keep* your hair is bad bad bad) and attempted to steam the dress. I figured if I got that done, I could at least cut the steamer off, and open the doors to the "breeze alley" of our motel and maybe it would be a little less rain-foresty.

Now the dress was one of those full length, poofy Scarlett O'Hara kind (I am sure there is a proper name, but since I only own two, I am no expert in dress "styles), and it was nearly as tall as I was. I tried to hang the dress on the steamer but it was just too long and was dragging on the disgusting floor.

[My dress, on a much thinner person...but in watermelon]

What to do? What to do?

Aha!! My dumb@ass came up with what (at the time) seemed nothing short of a brilliant solution. I would put the steamer on the bed, hang the dress from that, and steam it.

This WOULD have been a great idea if A) the steamer was made of cast iron and B) it didn't have roller wheels and C) the dress didn't weigh a lot more than the steamer. No sooner had I hung the roughly 35lb dress when the whole water filled thing tipped over...onto my dress, subsequently crashing everything to the floor. In fact, the entire butt of my dress was soaked right through the crinoline. At this point, I definitely started cursing and even made up a few new words, and then I cried. At *exactly* that moment my dear sweet husband came back to pick me up, expecting me to have my hair and makeup done, and dressed ironed/steamed. HA!! Was he ever in for a rude awakening!

He was assaulted by the Amazonian feel as soon as he entered the room, only to find his wife wearing only a bra and panties, velcro curlers in still wet hair, crying, and kneeling on the floor desperately trying to towel off her very expensive bridesmaid dress. I give him a lot of credit. Lesser men would have turned around and immediately fun far far away. But he must really love me, because instead of asking what the hell happened, or giving me a bunch of crap about it, he told me he would take care of the dress, and I could finish getting ready. Hallelujah. Amen.

I put on a blouse and shorts, opened the door to the room, and plugged my blow dryer into the single outlet located near the sink.

ZZZZTTTTT!! (I know that sound)



Oh. My. God.

I just blew the power to the room. No power. Nada. Zip. Zero. Zilch. Pure Darkness.

Insert maniacal "psychiatric ward" type laughter here.

Lloyd, being calm, cool and collected went down to the front desk and asked them to reset the breaker. Apparently, he hadn't yet had to deal with the mean women working the front desk. Good luck with that, I thought.

There was nothing I could do at that point, but wait. And wait. Ten to fifteen minutes later, he stomped back into the room, pissed off, and explained to me (with gritted teeth) that the building maintenance guy didn't know how to reset the breaker, and that it was "going to be awhile".

Insert more maniacal laughter here.

What the hell do I do now? I wasn't dressed, didn't have any part of my hair done, didn't have any makeup on my exceedingly greasy face, had giant pink ghetto rollers in my hair, my dress was soaking wet, and I couldn't see in the dark to gather up my stuff. On the plus side, since the steamer had been shut off, the room was slightly less tropical. Very slightly.

The only option was to call my dad and beg to borrow his room at the mansion to get dressed. Of course, he had no issue with that. I am sure he heard something in my voice that said, if you don't do this, I may end up killing you, so he really didn't have too many options.

The downside of this (haha...where was the UPSIDE?) was having to to do the walk of shame into the mansion with the big pink velcro curlers still in my hair.



The wedding itself was lovely. Hot, but beautiful. My dad's room at the mansion was amazing, probably the nicest room I have ever seen in my life. His bathroom, alone, was bigger than our entire room at motel hell. We were gypped...no doubt.

Much later that night, we arrived back to motel hell, the power was back on, our air conditioner was working, especially after Lloyd banged on it a few times. We slept the sleep of the dead, our stress was over. I had no more complaints after that, after all....what more could have happened?