The hotels - aka: I love kids, just not yours

On our way to and from Minneapolis, we stayed at the Days Inn in Bismarck.  It was a nice clean little hotel with a great breakfast room (accompanied by a great breakfast!) and a cheery outlook on life.  The lobby had a few couches, a flat screen TV and a computer for guests.  It was lovely.

We checked in the first evening and went out for supper.  We got back early and headed to our room to relax.  We had forgotten there would be a pool there so didn't bring our suits, but figured that was okay.  We sat down to enjoy a restful evening and watch some TV.

Then the banging started. 

We were on the first floor, just down the hall from the pool.  Across from us -- and immediately next door -- were two rooms for one family.  The kids stayed in one room, the adults in the other, and the doors perpetually remained open. 

There was much screaming and gnashing of teeth.  And that was just from me.

One kid would run across the hall and yell about something.  Then he would run back and bang on the door because someone had shut it behind him (likely for being a tattletale).  Someone else would shout about something and someone else would knock.  The doors were so thin, it sounded as though they were knocking on our door and numerous times through the night, I thought they were.

The Guy drifted off to sleep and never heard a thing.  I put my earphones on and cursed the reproductive organs of the people in the next room.  I slept from when they finally went to sleep until they got up the next morning.  AT 6AM.  But, the bed was flat and hard and uncomfortable, so I really wasn't missing anything.

On our way back, we decided to avoid the pool crowd and get a room on the second floor.  We did.  Right next door to Loud Talker and across the hall from Unruly Children.  Again, The Guy slept relatively soundly until 2am when Loud Talker had a fight on his cell phone with a friend.  We turned on all the appliances and fans and drowned that jackass out.  If only.

To ease our nerves, and to not have to go home for another day, we decided to stay in Minot before coming home.  We booked a hotel online but had a great deal of trouble as apparently the entire city was booked up for a motorcycle convention.  We ended up at the Super 8, but had a great price, so thought nothing of it.

Until we got there.  The lobby was big enough to turn around in, but just barely.  The hotel clerk was a Russian dominatrix in a bad mood.  The carpet was old and dirty -- it had likely been installed in the 60s and cleaned last then too.  We wandered the creaky and dank hallway towards our room and I contemplated how many people were being murdered on the other sides of the doors we passed.

Our room was an old smoking room and smelled like tobacco, sweat, and mistakes.  The sink held to the wall perilously and had numerous unidentified stains along the bottom.  The walls had a dripping brown stain to them and the shower had a cigarette stain in the porcelain.

It was lovely.

We sank on the bed in horror (after I removed the bedspread!) and were met with the most comfortable mattress known to man.  It sunk gently beneath us and seemed to whisper that everything would be alright. 

We slept that night with little noise and a sense of security.  It was lovely. 

But I'm never leaving the house again.