OK, so I changed the title a little bit. I'm allowed. 
Here goes...it's a long post, so be warned.
Linda and I arrive at Midway around 11:30 am on Thursday. Her flight is on time from Atlanta, and mine is on time from New York City. So far, everything is cool.
The folks who work at the Hilton Garden Inn told Linda that a cab from Midway to the hotel would be about $40. We hop in a cab and tell the driver where we are going. He has no clue. Do you have directions? Um, no, we dont. :Smug: He gets out of the cab, talks to the dispatcher, comes back and says that will be $80. Excuse me? I dont think so. We get out of the cab. Linda has directions for the train and bus that will get us a lot closer to the hotel. We figure well do that and take a cab from that point, since it will be cheaper.
We do the train thing, no problem. Since we are closer, we decide to call the hotel from the train station to see if they will send cab to us at the train station. Yes, they will. So we wait, and wait, and wait some more. We call the hotel again. And wait some more. And call the hotel again. They finally admit that they cant get a cab, and that we should take a bus, and that we can walk from there. OK.
We get on the bus, and proceed to drive a LONG way through probably the worst neighborhood I have ever seen (and I live in New York City, so that is saying a lot!). There was this creepy guy standing in the aisle next to me who just stared at me for about 20 minutes until he finally gets off the bus. Linda thought he looked like a serial killer he probably was.
We get off the bus at the last stop and realize that we are somewhere in the armpit of hell. We call the hotel to get walking directions, and are told that it is too far to walk. Huh? You told us before that we could walk from there! OK, the hotel is sending a cab to us at the bus depot. We wait. And wait some more. And call the hotel again. And wait. And call the hotel. No cab. The lady at the hotel says that they are having trouble getting a cab to go into that neighborhood (big surprise), and that she will come pick us up herself if a cab doesnt show up.
A cab (or something like it) finally does appear. We tell the guy where we are going. He has no clue. We are only like 3 miles from the place and he doesnt know what we are talking about! He calls his dispatcher, and then says Oh, OK. I didnt know there was a Hilton over THERE. This of course does not bode well.
We finally get to the hotel after the guy charges us $15 to go about 3 miles. It has taken us about 3.5 hours to get to the hotel from Midway airport, which is a grand total of about 15 miles! We figure that it cant get any worse. WRONG!!
We then find out that the only places to eat within walking distance are a rib shack and a pancake house/diner. At this point, we are so hungry we dont care, so we go over to the rib shack. The food was edible, at least. After killing some time there, we decide to walk back to the hotel. This is where the REAL fun begins.
We pass the Econolodge and are walking past the Motel 6 when a cop pulls up beside us and stops the car. He rolls down the window on the passenger side, leans over, and does the come hither gesture with his finger. Linda leans down and says yes, officer? He says Are you two ladies here on business? Business? What the (a couple of seconds tick by and then we realize what he really means). WHAT????
Linda told him that we were in from out of town. He repeats the question. Linda answers No, pleasure, at which point I nearly drop dead in the middle of the road. We tell him again that we are from out of town. He asks us what hotel we are staying in, and we tell him the Hilton. He obviously doesnt believe us. Linda then says that she didnt expect to be in this type of neighborhood. He got rather bristly what do you mean by THAT? There are no restaurants around here, Linda replied. Oh he says, well, there is an Applebees about a mile that way After rattling off a list of more places, we thank him and continue walking.
After discussing the fact that we cant believe that we were just accused of being prostitutes, I turn around and realize that the cop was following us, just inching along the road. We walk through the parking lot of the Best Western and climb the stairs to get to the Hilton parking lot. We turn around and he is in the Best Western lot. We walk into the Hilton and go up to the front desk. I turn around to look again and now he has pulled into the Hilton parking lot. After purchasing a few items from the little store in the lobby, we go up to our room, laughing hysterically. When we get to the room, we run to the window to look out and the cop is still sitting there!! He FINALLY drives away.
At this point we are still laughing hysterically. Linda plugs her cell phone into the wall to charge it nothing. Hmmm, maybe the outlet is dead. We try another. Nope. No lights, no TV, nada. We call down to the front desk. They apologize profusely and say they will give us another room. We go down to the front desk, get the new keys, and the manager says that he will walk us up to the room. No!, we both practically yell. The manager must have thought we were nuts, but we knew that the last thing we need is for that cop to have come back and see us going up to the room with a man! He insists that it is no problem and goes up with us anyway. Luckily the cop must have found something better to do than harass us.
There is more insanity and craziness, but I will stop here. Kinda hard to top the whole prostitution thing!
Chris, Rob, and/or John if you are reading this, please do me and Linda a favor. PUT THE FEST IN A PLACE WHERE WE CAN WALK OUTSIDE WITHOUT GETTING HARRASSED BY THE COPS FOR PROSTITUTION, FER CRIPES SAKE! Lovely neighborhood you chose!
Special thanks to Bob and Paul for driving us around for the rest of the weekend!
That is our story and we are sticking to it.
Steph
Here goes...it's a long post, so be warned.
Linda and I arrive at Midway around 11:30 am on Thursday. Her flight is on time from Atlanta, and mine is on time from New York City. So far, everything is cool.
The folks who work at the Hilton Garden Inn told Linda that a cab from Midway to the hotel would be about $40. We hop in a cab and tell the driver where we are going. He has no clue. Do you have directions? Um, no, we dont. :Smug: He gets out of the cab, talks to the dispatcher, comes back and says that will be $80. Excuse me? I dont think so. We get out of the cab. Linda has directions for the train and bus that will get us a lot closer to the hotel. We figure well do that and take a cab from that point, since it will be cheaper.
We do the train thing, no problem. Since we are closer, we decide to call the hotel from the train station to see if they will send cab to us at the train station. Yes, they will. So we wait, and wait, and wait some more. We call the hotel again. And wait some more. And call the hotel again. They finally admit that they cant get a cab, and that we should take a bus, and that we can walk from there. OK.
We get on the bus, and proceed to drive a LONG way through probably the worst neighborhood I have ever seen (and I live in New York City, so that is saying a lot!). There was this creepy guy standing in the aisle next to me who just stared at me for about 20 minutes until he finally gets off the bus. Linda thought he looked like a serial killer he probably was.
We get off the bus at the last stop and realize that we are somewhere in the armpit of hell. We call the hotel to get walking directions, and are told that it is too far to walk. Huh? You told us before that we could walk from there! OK, the hotel is sending a cab to us at the bus depot. We wait. And wait some more. And call the hotel again. And wait. And call the hotel. No cab. The lady at the hotel says that they are having trouble getting a cab to go into that neighborhood (big surprise), and that she will come pick us up herself if a cab doesnt show up.
A cab (or something like it) finally does appear. We tell the guy where we are going. He has no clue. We are only like 3 miles from the place and he doesnt know what we are talking about! He calls his dispatcher, and then says Oh, OK. I didnt know there was a Hilton over THERE. This of course does not bode well.
We finally get to the hotel after the guy charges us $15 to go about 3 miles. It has taken us about 3.5 hours to get to the hotel from Midway airport, which is a grand total of about 15 miles! We figure that it cant get any worse. WRONG!!
We then find out that the only places to eat within walking distance are a rib shack and a pancake house/diner. At this point, we are so hungry we dont care, so we go over to the rib shack. The food was edible, at least. After killing some time there, we decide to walk back to the hotel. This is where the REAL fun begins.
We pass the Econolodge and are walking past the Motel 6 when a cop pulls up beside us and stops the car. He rolls down the window on the passenger side, leans over, and does the come hither gesture with his finger. Linda leans down and says yes, officer? He says Are you two ladies here on business? Business? What the (a couple of seconds tick by and then we realize what he really means). WHAT????
Linda told him that we were in from out of town. He repeats the question. Linda answers No, pleasure, at which point I nearly drop dead in the middle of the road. We tell him again that we are from out of town. He asks us what hotel we are staying in, and we tell him the Hilton. He obviously doesnt believe us. Linda then says that she didnt expect to be in this type of neighborhood. He got rather bristly what do you mean by THAT? There are no restaurants around here, Linda replied. Oh he says, well, there is an Applebees about a mile that way After rattling off a list of more places, we thank him and continue walking.
After discussing the fact that we cant believe that we were just accused of being prostitutes, I turn around and realize that the cop was following us, just inching along the road. We walk through the parking lot of the Best Western and climb the stairs to get to the Hilton parking lot. We turn around and he is in the Best Western lot. We walk into the Hilton and go up to the front desk. I turn around to look again and now he has pulled into the Hilton parking lot. After purchasing a few items from the little store in the lobby, we go up to our room, laughing hysterically. When we get to the room, we run to the window to look out and the cop is still sitting there!! He FINALLY drives away.
At this point we are still laughing hysterically. Linda plugs her cell phone into the wall to charge it nothing. Hmmm, maybe the outlet is dead. We try another. Nope. No lights, no TV, nada. We call down to the front desk. They apologize profusely and say they will give us another room. We go down to the front desk, get the new keys, and the manager says that he will walk us up to the room. No!, we both practically yell. The manager must have thought we were nuts, but we knew that the last thing we need is for that cop to have come back and see us going up to the room with a man! He insists that it is no problem and goes up with us anyway. Luckily the cop must have found something better to do than harass us.
There is more insanity and craziness, but I will stop here. Kinda hard to top the whole prostitution thing!
Chris, Rob, and/or John if you are reading this, please do me and Linda a favor. PUT THE FEST IN A PLACE WHERE WE CAN WALK OUTSIDE WITHOUT GETTING HARRASSED BY THE COPS FOR PROSTITUTION, FER CRIPES SAKE! Lovely neighborhood you chose!
Special thanks to Bob and Paul for driving us around for the rest of the weekend!
That is our story and we are sticking to it.
Steph
