Back to reality...

Well we had to come home sometime. We had a fun weekend in Vancouver without children, but all too soon reality set in. The kids survived with our respite provider Gayle, and more importantly, when we got home yesterday afternoon they hadn't tied her up to a kitchen chair with duct tape. Gayle went on and on about how wonderful the kids were, no problems she couldn't handle, and the child that I was most concerned about behavior wise was "a shining star".

Now don't get me wrong, I'm thrilled the kids behaved and cooperated with Gayle. But why does she get all the good behavior? (Can you hear my whining?) That was a redundant question because I know the reasons why - I could write a book on the reasons why. But just for one weekend, I would like to have that child behave as "a shining star" for me. (More whining.)

But I am mentally going back to my happy place. My latest happy place is the Sutton Place Hotel on Burrard Street in Vancouver. It involves cute young men in uniforms (valet service and bell boys) and free drinks in the lounge at check in because our room wasn't ready yet. (No whining.) Have you ever had a Twisted Cosmo? They are very yummy and involve mysterious quantities of orange vodka and some other yummy flavors. And it's amazing how much better things taste when they're free.

And here's another question for you. What's the first thing you do when you get into your hotel room? Do you check the sheets? (For the record, the sheets at the Sutton Place are at least 400 count and ironed and clean!). Do you check and see how clean the bathroom is? (Sutton Place - clean and roomy with lots of free amenities). Do you check for extra blankets? (None at SP but I'm sure one of those cute young men would bring us up some if we needed them to.)

Here's what I do whenever I get to a new hotel room. I check all the cupboards, drawers, closets etc. for unopenned booze that the previous tenants left behind. And of course there is a story to explain. When I was about 8 years old my family headed out for the marathon trip to Vancouver one weekend. Not something we normally did as there was no Coquihalla back then and the trip took forever in our gas-guzzling avocado green Chrysler with vinyl seats. We made it as far as Keremeos before something went wrong and we spent at least 4 hours at the one and only gas station in town. When we finally got back on the road again it was getting late and my dad drove as far as Hope before he gave in to exhaustion. (Hence our family joke that is very old and tired...I hope we get to Hope.) So we check in to some dark small hotel room where everything was brown and because us kids are bored, we start looking around for things to do. My older sister chose to search the ancient brown dresser and discovered an unopenned 26 oz. bottle of Rye, which just happened to be my parents' drink of choice. So once again the older sister got to be the "shining star". We began a new tradition that trip of always checking for hidden treasure. Not that we travelled in motels very much, but when we did, we looked for booze.

So was there booze at the Sutton Place? Nope, just a half bag of Shreddies. How disappointing. Oh well, I will continue in my never ending quest whenever I stay in a hotel.