Motel life

It occurred to me this morning as I was trying to figure out how to make coffee that motel owners have hidden codes connected to light switches. Seems like all the natural places for the everyday ordinary dumbie like me to simply turn on the light do not match the schemes of motel designers-----except for Tom Bodette, that is. He leaves his lights on at Motel 6.

Well, we like to sleep at night so we avoid Motel 6. That decision leaves us with the challenge of figuring out in the middle of the night where to turn on the bathroom light without waking up those attempting to continue their slumber.

This morning I discovered that the switch to the bathroom was not IN the bathroom. Instead, it was located on the far side of the sink area. When I did flip it, I discovered that it lit up half the motel room along with the bathroom.

My mother can't hear if I stumble and fall on my face or drop all the contents of my over-stuffed overnight bag on the floor, but she CAN see the light. Fortunate for me, she continued sleeping.

Later, I had to figure out how to run the mini coffee maker in the far corner, far away from any other light. So, I tried to switch on the lamp next to it. Nothing. I bent over and searched for the cord. Wasn't plugged in. I plugged it in, then hit the switch again. No light. Apparently, the bulb has burned out, or there's a different combination.

I've been in motels where a master switch clear across the room tells the lamp switch it's okay to go to work. I was too lazy to walk across the room to check. So, I looked over at Mother, and she was wide awake. That meant I could turn on the lamp next to her bed and maybe shed enough light on that coffee maker to figure out how to brew my first cup of caffeine.

Turns out this coffee maker was unlike any I'd ever seen. It brews individual cups and has a separate plastic container for each coffee bag. My next challenge was to figure out how to get the plastic covering to rip open.

How many of you have tried to open cracker packages or those nut packages on your airline flight? I think that's why they give you so many bags of peanuts; they know they're going to get them back, unused because the dumb passengers couldn't get the damn things open.

Traveling certainly brings out the worst of our dexterous and mental inadequacies. And then there's the stupid remote that refuses to send the message to change the darn channel, making you get out of bed and go push TV button after all.

I wonder what the pioneers crossing America would have done, if faced with these irritating challenges.