It’s said the West is nice this time of year, that’s what they say
My favorite heavy metal band from the 70s was Blue Oyster Cult and the title of one of my favorite songs from them almost matches the title of this post – Days instead of Day.
This is a Public Service Announcement: If you ever need to stay overnight in Leesville, Louisiana do not stay in the Holiday Inn Express there. Stay at the rundown motel next door with the swimming pool that is 3/4 full of green algae water, it’ll probably be nicer. Here is a partial list of things that were wrong:
- The rug between the beds was not vacuumed, there was lint and what was possibly clothes soap powder on the floor.
- There was also a small round red squishy thing near one of the beds, possibly a cat toy.
- Inside the closet were the totally dry swimsuits of two small children on the hotels hangers.
- When you turned on the TV there was nothing but snow. It defaults to the cable input which is not connected. You have to hit the I/O button on the side of the TV to select the Component Input.
- The TV has Direct TV and no guide. Even if it did it wouldn’t help, there is no other way to select the channel except using the up/down toggle on the remote.
- Every other channel you scroll through is either an all infomercial our is not part of the package the hotel has bought.
- The screen on the window, which I didn’t even consider opening, was torn and the bottom third was gone.
- The shower head in the bath was not the typical HIE unit but a random brand thing that had a spray selector that wouldn’t change, so you ended up with a spray that resembled the pattern of Death Star ray.
- Surprise, the bathroom floor was dirty.
- The usually mediocre breakfast was shitty, fewer than usual selections, food not really hot and the sometime saving grace cinnamon bun was so dry as to be inedible.
Maybe just bypass Leesville entirely. A couple miles up the road from the hotel I found a coffee shop, so I thought maybe I can get a good caramel latte there. The last two I have tried on this trip, Green River, UT and Hammond, LA have been respectfully, awful and then sub-par. Well, the one from “Back To Nature” was worse than the other two, it was served in a Styrofoam cup and I can’t be sure, but the caramel shot I think was a squirt of Hershey’s caramel ice cream sundae syrup.
To top off the day just after crossing into Texas either the box truck or SUV following on its tail tossed a rock up and plunked the lower part of the windshield creating a nice star crack. It didn’t seem to spread any on the rest of the 300 mile drive, but I cicrcled it tonight with a Sharpie so I can see if it does expand further.
At least we don’t end up like the three kids in Blue Oyster Cult’s song.
It wasn’t until the car suddenly stopped
In the middle of a cold and barren place
And the other guy turned and spilled
Three boys blood, did they know a trap had been laid?
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- Crockett, TX – 75835 (05/31/23)
