RCFM Travels: Thursday

[vakkotaur]

Thursday started early. I got some sleep, but I think I was drifting in and out of consciousness for a while. I got up at 3 AM and three of us (Guan, SpiritWolfe, and myself) were on the road by 3:30 AM. Guan (an iGUANa) slept for some considerable time, and SpiritWolfe slept through most of Missouri which wasn't a problem. They had been up much later than I and had helped move (and load?) the sound gear.

We got into St. Louis just as the beginnings of anything-but-rush hour were manifesting, but we got lucky. There were only a couple slow-downs and eastbound traffic was always moving if a bit slow in a couple places. Westbound looked rather like a parking lot. The rest of the trip was pretty uneventful aside from a difference about how to get into Huntsville. SpiritWolfe had some directions that would have done the job, but I found it easier to just stay on I-65 and take I-565 in. After one stop to get things sorted out as regards directions I dropped them off and made my way to the hotel with only a minor and easily corrected directional goof.

Checking in was, this year, painless. Unloading the car took many trips and I found later that the one entry- and stairway I needed (when I wasn't using the elevator) was also the only one without working air conditioning. As I was unloading, kinkyturtle called to say he was in Huntsville and would arrive soon.

I'm not sure who all arrived when, but I met up with chakawolf and jugularjaguar. I had a couple things for Jugular and a bunch of root beer and ginger ale for something he was planning. Somehow the required quantity hadn't been communicated all that well and he was taken aback at the amount of stuff I'd brought. That was also when Jugular realized I had a car and could provide transportation. Unfortunately it was also not made clear when that would be needed and it came a surprise to me a bit later when we went out.

What I had expected to happen was we'd got take care of the thing actually mentioned, and we'd find someplace for supper since I hadn't eaten in several hours. What actually happened is we went someplace, found they didn't have the desired item(s) and then proceeded to wander all over the store, bought stuff that needed refrigeration so stopping to eat wasn't workable, and then we went back to the hotel. I don't want to seem unreasonable, but I am seriously considering that next time I am asked about providing a ride that I will set forth a few rules about it. I wasn't expecting anything fancy, Subway would have done just fine.

Later someone brought up the idea of going to a place called Ryan's, which is a buffet. I had been considering trying the hotel restaurant, but had been warned off of it. I think unless I'd gotten food poisoning there (and I have not heard of any cases of that there) I'd have been better off doing that.

We got to Ryan's. I now have metal bent in ways I would rather it not be bent on my car and bits of broken plastic and headlights roughly held in place with bungee cords. Fortunately, that was the extent of the damage - bent metal and broken plastic. Fluids stayed contained where they should be, nobody was injured, airbags did not deploy, glass did not break. While someone else did pay for my food and drink, it will likely be the most expensive meal I've ever had. And it wasn't just my (likely very biased by then) opinion that the food was disappointing and the atmosphere oppressive. Someone speculated that air conditioning had been shut off to encourage people to leave even though it was before closing time. I left having exactly zero intention of ever going to Ryan's again.

Naturally, the rest of night wasn't exactly the most enjoyable for me. I think I managed to mask the worst of it and be fairly sociable and hopefully not screw things up for anyone else. That was also me trying to distract myself and get my mind on more pleasant things.

Somewhere in all that there was a minor snafu that was readily rectified. There were enough key cards for everyone in the room and I did hand off on to someone else before I'd left so if they showed up it would be simple. It didn't work out. Someone showed up and got in contact with someone without the extra card. They had the idea of duplicating the one working card they had - except that the hotel naturally doesn't do that. What they do is change the room code and issue new cards. Which meant the other card no longer worked. Fortunately everyone could be found and the whole process done over again to get everyone working cards.

Comments

[foolscap001.livejournal.com]

Once upon a time, Ryan's was quite good. If the one in Clive, IA and the one you went to are any indication, that is no longer the case.

The last straw for us was going to their newly-announced weekend breakfast. The banners announced that breakfast started at 7:30 a.m. They didn't mention when it ended. We got there around 10:25 a.m. Sunday, and bought our breakfast. All seemed well... until we got to the counters and saw breakfast items not only not being replaced, but being pulled out from under people's noses. Not a word had been said or posted about when breakfast ends. We ate the scraps of rubbery scrambled eggs and such we'd managed to get and irpooh had a discussion with management. We were refunded our money. I sent feedback via the Ryan's web site, and got no response. I don't think we'll be returning.