Your scribbler has been driven somewhat demented over the last two weeks.
What’s that?
Oh, okay. More demented than usual, as a result of booking a hotel.
Yep, that’s what I said.
Loyal and very attentive colyoomistas may recall that back in May 2004, I fessed up to being an anonymous reviewer of hotels for quality newspapers (not a tautology!) for over two decades.
Of course, as soon as I did, I had to retire from that particular gig, as in my opinion there is zero point in reviewing an hotel if they know you’re writing a review. All of a sudden you’re in a beautiful room and can I do anything else for you, sir?
Being a naive fool, I thought that once I’d left the reviewing game, staying in hotels would return to being a pure pleasure.
Someone comes in and makes your bed; gives you new towels, fresh coffee capsules and more putrid cartons of UHT milk.
You fill out and hang the breakfast menu on your room’s door handle and lo, at 08:30 there’s a knock and a young man is delivering your scrambles and bacon, tea and toast.
In sad little Adley world, that’s pretty close to as good as it gets.
And yes, I do still love staying in hotels, but that pleasure is now mitigated by the onslaught of bollocky emails that one has to endure when booking a room these days.
A couple of weeks ago, being ever-so-slightly brassic, I decided to make the most of the current price of gold by flogging a few small items I inherited from my grandparents.
An antique auctioneer advised me that yes, he could put one or two of my items into an auction, but I’d wait months for the correct collectors sale day, and then pay him a commission.
In a rare display of altruism, he advised me that I’d be better off going to a particular shop he knew in Dublin, mentioning his name and getting a fair price for the gold weight of the lot, there and then, in cash.
You can take the boy out of London, but you can’t take London out of the boy.
Cash?
A wad?
Yessirrreeee!
Well, if I’m headed to Dublin, I might as well make a night of it, I decided.
I’ve been at home since before Christmas, so a night away from my own cooking and dishes would be most welcome.
Over those 20 years of reviewing I learned that the first stop in any hotel search should be the hotel’s website. The prices offered on their own sites are often very competitive with third party bookers, like Booking.com, Trivago and Expedia.
If you’re offered a bargain elsewhere, contact the hotel and tell them. See how quickly they offer you the same discount.
This is presuming you’ve chosen an independent and ideally family-run hotel (like my West of Ireland favourites: Flannerys in Galway City and Rosleague Manor in Connemara), which is where I’d head every day of the week.
Trouble is, in Dublin ,all the choices were corporate chains, so I booked a room in an apart-hotel, close to the shop that I was aiming for.
All was good.
Here’s the email confirming my booking.
Perfect.
Here’s another email, telling me to make the most of my trip, and what’s available in the area.
Erm, that’s fine, I s’pose.
Here’s another email.
Do you want to upgrade your room?
I feel my inner grumpy git awake from surly slumber.
No I don’t want a bloody upgrade.
Stop it. Go away.
Leave me alone.
If I wanted a better room, I’d’ve booked a better room. I’d been to their website, looked on Booking, read reviews on Tripadvisor and made what a pretentious prat might call an ‘educated choice.’
Oh for god’s sake, it’s only an hotel room.
Let’s not get carried away.
Then I receive yet another email, written in what I can only assume is a style they believe Millennials or Gen Zees might find amusing.
It went 100% like this, in tone and format; I kid ye not:
“Hey Charlie
Whoop!
Whoop
doopy
doopy
doo!
We are so excited to see you.
It’s great you booked with us.
We’re so excited about your stay.
Yippee
Yippee
Aye ayyyy...”
As I read this nonsensical sycophantic drivel, my grumpy git engine moved rapidly up through the gears into overdrive, outrage and disbelief, but that wasn’t the end of it.
The very next day I received yet another email. The fifth for a one night booking.
Do you want to bid for a room upgrade?
You wot? Is this an effin’ joke?
Do I want to BID for a room upgrade?
Yeh, sure, of course I do, ‘cos my life is so crushingly empty I can think of no better way to spend my valuable yet vacant time than competing with other sad losers in a fight to give you more money for something I don’t even want and grrrr and grrrowl and roaaaarrr and -
I suddenly started coughing, instantly recognising the bad taste in my mouth as evidence of a nascent chest infection.
Given that half of Ireland was at that moment laid up with respiratory viruses, and my 1.5 very scarred lungs must be maintained with respect, I grabbed the chance to postpone my trip to Dublin and cancel my room.
Another email.
Would you like to take a survey, to share your reasons why you cancelled your room?
Would I?
In the modern language of hotel reservations:
Yabba dabba dooby dooo!
Hold me back and allow me to explain why to you!
©Charlie Adley
21.01.2025
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