I checked into a hotel the other night in a little town outside of Lexington. It wasn’t a fancy hotel, but I knew it would be clean and I was able to use some of my reward points to pay for it.
The clerk was a very nice young man.
“Thank you for being an elite rewards customer with us,” he said. “Because of your loyalty, we’ve upgraded you into one of our suites.”
That was very nice, I thought. I was travelling alone, and a suite would be far more space than I really needed But it was a wonderful gesture.
“You’ll be on the third floor. Elevators are to your left,” the clerk said as he handed me a little envelope with my keys.
He didn’t really hand me keys. Hotels haven’t used keys in a long, long time. Instead, what he handed me was a little plastic card that looks a little like a credit card.
The idea is that you slide the card into a slot on your hotel room door. If the light on the door turns red, you did it wrong. If it turns green, you press down on the door handle and open the door.
I couldn’t find the slot on my hotel room door. I ran my hands over the door knob. It was a little dark in the hall, so I turned on the light on my cell phone and put it close to the knob.
No slot.
I looked at the key card. I saw some instructions.
“Wave the back of this card over the reading device. When the light turns green, open the door.”
OK, I thought, this is like the scanner at the grocery, but instead of the register reading the bar code, the door is reading the back of my key card.
I waved the card quickly in front of the reader. Red light.
I turned the card around and waved the other end. Red light.
Maybe I’m supposed to do this slowly, I thought.
So I waved the card slowly in front of the reader. Red light.
I turned the card over and waved the other side. Red light.
I held the card still at the reader. Red light.
By this time, I really need to go to the bathroom. Isn’t that always the way? There’s a convenient toilet on the other side of this door. If only I can get in.
I gave up and went downstairs.
“I can’t open my door,” I said.
“Did you wave the card in front of reading device?” the clerk said. Only this time he wasn’t so nice. He said it with a bit of a sneer. Kind of like a snooty waiter when you ask if you can have ice cream with the pie a la mode.
I wanted to be a smart aleck. I wanted to say, “No, I tried to open it using a Jedi mind trick.” But I didn’t.
“Yes,” I said. “I waved it several times. Slow and fast. It won’t open.”
The clerk turned to a young woman who was now also working at the desk and said, “I’ll be right back.”
We got to my room. He waved the card quickly in front of the reader. Green light came on.
“See? That wasn’t hard,” the clerk sneered.
I would have felt more embarrassed, except for the clerk’s sneering. And I got even.
I was staying alone. But I made sure to use every towel in that suite
