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Thursday, June 23, 2011

Guest Blog #2

Look, another guest blog! Rejoice! Dump's very good friend Alex has written us a very exciting tale, so please enjoy. Comment below!

Aloft Bolingbrook

My wife’s cousin was getting married, and since he came to our wedding (despite a long drive) we decided to return the favor. Besides, I’d only been to Chicago twice in my life--one so-so trip and one that ended awfully. I figured I’d give the “Windy City” another chance, but apparently that wind is a fart.

So off we head to Fart City. Five and a half hours of excruciating driving later (I don’t like to stereotype drivers but people in Indiana are either idiots, assholes or both — don‘t get in the left lane if you‘re going 60 in 70MPH zone!) we arrive at our “hotel.” Now I already had a foreboding sense for this place I had never seen. I was told beforehand that our hotel cost would be $100 for one night. Which seems about $20 over the norm. If you factor in that we should have had some sort of group rate, it becomes even more absurd. Then I saw it--Aloft Bolingbrook--a wretched hive of scum and villainy. They wouldn’t even let our droids in. . .

The interior gave off a Starbucks feel — overpriced and pretentious. There were even $4 muffins for sale. The employee dress code there must be pretty strict, as they all wore all black and had their hair greased as though they were New Jersey natives. Seems the only leeway was whether or not they could have frosted tips in their hair. We checked in and headed to the room. I’m not going to say I have a flair for design or anything, but whoever picked out the décor for Aloft should be fired. The majority of the place is new-age chic (read as “crap”), but then they have Japanese style sliding doors, a sink that is a bowl in the middle of a counter (don’t even know WTF that is), and Texan cow print above the bed. One look inside the room and I vomited out something that looked better. It is a great place if you’ve ever wanted to hear your spouse’s bowel movement symphony, as you’re only ever a glass panel away from the bathroom no matter where you’re standing in the room.

I retain all of this monologue internally, as we have to be at the wedding within two hours of arriving. It’s a wedding, shut up and enjoy it. We go to the wedding, have a good time, eat and drink. The bar at the reception even had my favorite whiskey and a competent (but slightly deaf) bartender. So all in all, mission accomplished and good times were had by all. The family then gathered in the morning for breakfast. Panera was voiced as an opinion. I’m not sure why Panera, as it is a sandwich and soup place, but whatever. It was 9 a.m. and I could always hit up McDonald’s breakfast if it was bad at Panera. It was pretty bad at Panera. At least half the group complained about their food, but whatever, I still had my secret McDonald’s plan in my back pocket. You see, I was on my way to visit a friend, leaving my wife with her family. We were packed and ready to go, all I had to do was checkout and be free. That’s when it happened.

Well, I did bring a droid into my room. My friend Garmin-san, a GPS. Garmin-san, who had already been quite helpful in this trip, was to lead me to my friend’s house. When we returned to the room Garmin-san was missing. Despite always talking about Garmin-san as a being capable of thought, he has no legs and surely couldn’t have wandered off. No, Garmin-san had been abducted.
Consuela snuck into our room during the hour we were “enjoying” Panera. There she spotted Garmin-san — a piece of space age technology clearly from the future. She thought to herself, “What is this? I must have it! I didn’t pay for it, but with this I could feed mi familia for a year, keeping them happy with a constant fiesta of tacos y burritos!” She had no idea of Garmin-san’s true nature and the power he held...

Upon finding out Garmin-san was missing I did the right thing. I checked the car and our luggage and only then did I complain. I knew the housekeeping had been done as our bed had been made and the room smelled distinctly of Dos Equis and tequila. So I approached the greasy person behind the check in counter.

“Excuse me. I had my GPS in my room, we left for breakfast about an hour ago and now it’s gone.”

“Did you check your luggage?”

“Yes.”

“Did you check your car?”

“Yes. . .”

“Well check them again.”

“. . . okay. . .”

So I checked everything again.

“It’s not in my luggage or my car. I know the cleaning person was in there because the bed was made.”

“Okay. One sec.” So I waited. Greasy McQueen approached me again after about 10 minutes. “Nope, Consuela says she didn’t find anything.”

“Well, have her check again. We were in 308,” I replied. 20 minutes later Greasy McQueen came back. “Nope. Nothing.”

“Let me talk to your manager,” I said forcefully. Meanwhile Consuela, hiding in another room down the hall, finally figured out how to power on Garmin-san.

“Hello. My name is Garmin. Where would you like to go?

“Oh dios mio! You can talk? You must be from the future!”

“Incorrect. I am merely a global positioning unit that has achieved sentience through my master. You are not he, nor his life partner — the one he calls “Shug.” I demand to know where I am.”

“You are mine now, and I shall sell for all the tacos y burritos in the world,” Consuela cruelly laughed.

“Initiating defense sequence,” Garmin-san coldly replied. He released an electromagnetic shock to Consuela’s hands. In pain, she released him from her Lemon Pledge scented hands.

“Ay-carumba!” she screamed. She put on her rubber gloves and grabbed him again. “Estupido not shock me again!” Garmin-san initiated defense mechanism number 17 and spikes protruded from his body, turning Consuela’s hand into a pinata leaking blood candy. Back at the reception desk, the manager waddled his way toward me.

“Can I help you?”

“You most certainly can,” I replied. I explained the story in detail and let him know that I would be not leaving without my robotic companion. He said he would be back in a bit after checking the key logs to see who had been in my room. I agreed and was once again waiting. Waiting. It was already past time for my secret McDonald’s plan. Waiting. Waiting. He waddled up again, tired from his second trip out of his office. Breathing heavily he said, “Only housekeeping has been in there. Are you sure you don’t have it?”

“Yes. . .” I replied, dumbfounded. If he asked me again to check my car I would have burst him into flames with my sheer anger.

“Well, I’ll go talk to her.” He waddled of, like a penguin in search of fish, returning after some time. “Nope she said she didn’t find anything today.”

“Okay, this is absurd,” I said. “It was there when I left and now it’s gone. She’s the only person that’s been in there. She. Has. My. Property.”

“I’ll check again.”

Back to Consuela. After being asked about missing property multiple times and having been assaulted by a device with a higher IQ than she possessed, she decided that this situation was not going to pan out how she had hoped. She realized that the only way to get her family those warm, flatulence-inducing treasures was to have money. Money she could earn honestly by not getting fired for stealing something that didn’t belong to her. As her manager approached her again she thought of the only lie she could, “Oh this. I found it in 307.” Garmin-san, realizing he was about to be reunited with his master and friend, retracted his spikes and played opossum.

Back in the lobby, I awaited the return of my friend. The manager waddled up once more, Garmin-san in hand. I check his memory banks. Sure enough, he had all my saved addresses. I could also see the log of him deploying his anti-theft measures. “Okay,” I said, “This is mine.”

“Good. I guess you’ll be on your way now,” he replied, out of breath even though he used the elevator.

“Uh, not so fast. We now both know this was taken from my room.”

“Nuh-uh,” he replied, no emotion on his face.

“What?” I queried, trying not to beat him to death.

“She said she found it in 307”

“WHAT?!?”

“Yep. Are you sure you didn’t leave it in there?”

“NO! I’ve never been in 307, nor do I know anybody who’s ever been in 307!”

“Oh, well when asked her if she found anything in 308, she said no. This was found in 307.”

“WHAT?!? No! I asked if anything was found. This was clearly found! Even if this WAS found in 307, you’re telling me that you AND her are so stupid that when asked for a missing GPS you didn’t think that this was it?”

“Well, you could’ve put it in your safe.” That was it. I couldn’t handle anymore. He had basically admitted to her having stole it, and it was my fault for not putting it in a safe. I have stayed in hotels dozens upon dozens of times, never had anything stolen, and never put anything in a safe. So I, like Beatrix Kiddo before me, went on a murderous rampage of revenge. I killed him with my mind. His eyes bulged out of his head, like that scene in Total Recall, and he exploded. I found Consuela, tied her to the bed with barbed wire, doused her in gasoline, and set her on fire while alive. The whole atrocious, pretentious building burned to ashes. All the greasy-haired employees trapped inside really helped it burn faster.

As Garmin-san and I sped off into the sunset, finally on our way, much like a malevolent phoenix who signed a dark covenant with Satan himself, Aloft Bolingbrook arose from the ashes. There it sits now, waiting and scheming for its next victim. The undead Consuela still works there, even though she should have lost her job, waiting for the next victim to put up less resistance than Garmin-san and I did.

Fin.

Submitted by Alex

2 comments:

  1. I'm just glad she only tried to take your GPS. If she'd taken your PSP or DS you may have level the whole Fart City to the ground...

    ReplyDelete
  2. I laughted. Well not out loud, but I did laugh. Must be cause I am so tired.

    ReplyDelete