LODGED BETWEEN A ROCK AND AN OVERPRICED PLACE

When I was a smug know-it-all bratty pre-teen (versus now when I am a smug know-it-all upper-middle-aged bratty pre-geezer), I remember internally rolling my eyes whenever I heard older folks reminisce about the price of stuff back when they were young. They’d go on and on about how you could see a movie for 50¢, buy gas for a quarter a gallon, and pay a dime for cup of coffee. Their talk seemed so antiquated and out of touch with the modern world I knew. But mom raised me right, so I listened respectfully and feigned an appropriate amount of interest so as to not be disciplined for disrespecting my elders. But inside my head I was a little rude-ass punk saying snotty things like ‘how about getting off your horse drawn buggy and stepping into the 20th century’.

I assume you know where I am going with this. We are already almost a quarter of the way through the 21st century and I’m fast approaching the same ‘back in my day’ territory that I used to mock. I’m sure when I am yammering on about rotary wall mounted telephones, 8-track tapes, and pre-cable TV of my childhood, some ennui-faced rude-ass punky kid is giving me that same antiquated out-of-touch treatment I used to mentally dish-out, only they are posting it on Snapchat or Instagram. Knowing this, I try not to be too much of a mossback oldster, but this past weekend I started feeling particularly outmoded when I caught myself again whining about the high price of hotels (at least I was not going on about walking five miles to school… everyday…  in the snow… uphill… both ways).   

It seems lately everyone has been all fired-up-in-arms grousing about the recent price jumps of pseudo-staples like eggs, gas, and soda. But the fluctuation of fuel prices has never affected my driving behaviors. My fizzy carbonated consumption has remained steady no matter what the cost. And even last year’s avian influenza influenced elevated egg prices didn’t change my omelet, scrambled, and hardboiled intake.

I think with most stuff, my mind just adjusts for inflation. I am certainly aware of it, but I just shell out the extra bucks without making a big fuss. There only seems to be one inflated price that has me calling a gougey flagrant foul. For some reason my stubborn brain wants to play a cantankerous grumpy round of ‘back in my day’ whenever I need to book a hotel/motel room.

During the peak of the Covid pandemic, prices on plane tickets and guest rooms fell dramatically when the travel industry collapsed onto itself amid the lockdowns and strict travel restrictions. My wife and I saved a bundle buying advance tickets for our cross-the-globe Maldives adventure during that time. Although we did not go till almost a year later, we pre-paid for the hotel and plane tickets back when international travel was more difficult than a five-year old pee-wee Pop Warner running back scoring a 50-yard touchdown run against the Kansas City Chiefs defense. But those days are very much gone!

When the world finally started getting back to normal, anyone with the tiniest wanderlust was ready to hit the road. And they did, en masse.  Airlines, hotels, and all the other travel sector related services were woefully understaffed as they tried to gear back into full-speed action. Overnight, travel became a confusing difficult mess. Then, under the guise of resetting, restaffing, and compensating for all the lost profits, prices suddenly surged to astronomically high levels way beyond where they were previously. And of course, even though those restarting kinks have all been long-ago worked out, the prices never leveled back down (“Ahhhhhhhh, it’s a profit deal?!!!?!!”)

Now I understand all of that, but my problem with hotel pricing is more complicated than just the recent price surges.  I did a ton of traveling for work 25 years ago. During that time period, it was common for me to live about eight months a year in all different types of motels, hotels, and short-term rentals. Some places were amazing, like my 25th floor suite in downtown Chicago’s Presidential Towers where the Loop was my backyard. A man can gain a lot of Mid-West mid-waist weight with Portillos, Giordano’s, and the famous Greek Island’s gyro joint all walking distance from my place.

In New Orleans, my snooty Garden District apartment right behind the Pontchartrain Hotel was just around the corner from my favorite Big Easy pub Igors, a crazy place full of wacky local characters. You literally never had to leave there since they were open 24hours, served food, had a pool table, a pinball game, three slot machines, and two washer-dryer units. The last time I brought friends there, a very drunk woman explained to us that it was okay that she was sloppily bumming money from us to play her favorite song on the jukebox, ‘since her AA sponsor was keeping an eye on her’ while he drank at the other end of the bar.

On other trips, my living options were very limited, and I ended up staying at some very scary dumps like the rickety roadside Blue Fountain Inn in rundown Gallipolis Ohio. A divey depressing one story motel that I do not think ever saw better days. There was an actual fountain in front of the place, but it neither worked nor was blue.  The isolated town on the West Virgina border had two claims to fame, a nearby nuclear power plant and the first Bob Evans ‘breakfast sausage biscuit themed’ restaurant. As my brother once said about Reno, it’s one of those towns where there is no good side of tracks.

Then there was the Shoney’s Inn (yes the same Shoney’s) in Douglas Georgia near the Okefenokee Swamp. There apparently are two Douglas Georgias, one outside of Atlanta and this other one that time forgot. The Douglas I lived in likely would not have existed if not for the nearby Wal-Mart distribution center that they built on the cheapest least valuable land in the state. That fact will certainly build some town pride!  When a friend came to visit me there, she left my motel room door open for 20 minutes to try and air out the stale food smell from the connected restaurant’s famous breakfast bar buffet that permeated the entire motel, only to discover that no-less than 300 flies had entered the room and were clinging to the cool white dated popcorn ceiling. I had to borrow an industrial vacuum from the maids to clean them all out.

I think because of all the travel I did back then, late last century’s prices for a hotel/motel rooms got ingrained in my head as what the average value should be. I don’t question a fancy loaded pizza costing $25 nowadays versus the 12 bucks it did back then, or a Big Mac jumping from $2.45 to $5.31 during the same time period. But the current prices of hotels, motels, VRBO, and AirB&Bs makes my head spin and for some reason I just can’t get used to it. I get re-surprised and re-frustrated every time I need to book a room.

Forbes recently reported that according to the 2023 Consumer Travel Index, U.S. hotel rates currently average about $212 per night. Which means a big-city mid-town bed bug-ridden flophouse dump is still pushing a hundy a night, while the Snooty McSnootson posh places are way, way over $600. I read those prices and my brain starts talking like that old arm-waving Lost In Space retro-robot repeating “does not compute… does not compute”  Those numbers are so much higher than my brain’s ye olde’ antiquated mental average value price thinks they should be.

It’s a Catch 22 thing, because every time I book a night, I can’t help feeling like I am being gouged. But when I complain about it, I feel like a coffin-dodger old codger reminiscing about 15¢ pinwheels and rock candy on a wooden stick in the glass jar atop the Rexall drugstore counter. But I am not going to stop travelling, so I need to find a way to get past this. Maybe I just need to dig out my old tent… wait a minute… they want how much to spend the night in the State Park campground?