We should have known from the street name
We were fortunate enough to be offered some time in a coastal Virginia condo as a second anniversary present. We've been married eight years now, and we needed a vacation. On the way we stopped by Henry and David to spend a gift card and pick up some treats for our stay. We brought all of our non-refrigerated goods from home so as to save money. We figure, if it is a historic tourist destination there might be a markup on the necessities of life.
The road was good to us and we traveled well across it. The car's odometer hit 200,000 miles, and yes, there was cake. We stopped at a Western Sizzling steak house. Sara's don't do Golden Coral or buffets in general, I would do them exclusively if I could. Woody's love wondrous variety.
I have a rule of restaurants that states that if you want decent simple food at a good price, just follow the old people and eat where they eat. We were among the youngest customers in the place and it was amazing. Sara ordered from the menu and I had the buffet.
After I got my plate I discovered I was trapped between a culinary Cilla and Charybdis. On my left stacked two and a half feet high in a warming pan was a ziggurat of fried chicken. On my right an equally sized and shaped pile of barbecued ribs. What to do... What to do? It is at times like this I think on the advice given by Mae West; "When choosing between two evils, choose the one you've never tried before." So I filled my plate with both and headed back to my table. The rest of the meal was something of a blur. I have heard on TV people describe what it is to be high on drugs. This was just like that, only legal, socially acceptable, and less expensive. Plus I could drive legally afterwards.
We arrived at our destination an hour and a half later, and I was still full. Good times.
Upon check in we were scheduled to a voluntary free breakfast where we would be offered a "no high pressure" presentation on why we should be an owner and not a guest at their fine chain of resort destinations. Not sure I'll make that, loath though I am to miss a free meal. Any possibility of giving into temptation is gone, and below you'll find out why.
Once we found our room/suite/apartment we wandered around noticing that this place has more square footage than our own humble hovel in the woods. However, we couldn't dwell on it, as we had to get to the grocery store for that all important half and half. I won't drink my coffee black if there is anyway around it, I don't care how good the coffee is. In this case it is a bag of Mahogany from Caribou Coffee. On the way there and back, we talked about what we saw we liked and wondered how we were going to recreate it on our salaries.
We were back in the apartment at about 10pm. (It is over 1100 sq ft, what would YOU call it) We got in, put the groceries away and became aware that there was a stampede going on on the floor above us. There were children. There were a LOT of children. They were running the sidewalk above us back and forth, they were in the room above us, jumping up and down. There was yelling and other happy "army of screaming kid" noises. By about midnight the screaming died down to a dull roar and the troops were brought into the room where they all fifty or so of them began jumping up and down. It sounded like a morter barrage and we tolerated up until we could no longer stand it. We had to sleep sometime and they were simply not going to allow this to happen. It was 1:30 in the morning. We called security and asked them to quiet the horde. I pondered offering to duct tape the offenders to the ceiling or something, but I dismissed the idea because I didn't have enough duct tape for all of them.
Security arrived in less than five minutes. We invited him inside and over the din we asked if he could maybe help us with our problem. He was up there for five minutes and when he returned, the noise was cut by half. He said there were way more people (children and adults) than we could imagine and he was going to write a report, that may lead to their being asked to go. So here it is 2:14am as I type these words and the barrage has become nothing more than sporadic bombardments. I could sleep through that I suppose.
I just have to click "publish" and try.
Oh yeah, the street name? "Rochambeau"
