Ramada Inn getting $2 million make-over is a Beloit Daily News article that appeared on the 25th of this month. It covers a lot of ground, which makes it an interesting read. Here are some amusing bits, well amusing to me.

Tejany said he had been looking to invest in the hospitality business in this area and liked the location, but he also admitted the project has been a challenge.

“I couldn’t find anything right,” he said of the facility’s initial condition. “It was hard to know where to start, the parking lot, the roof, the signage …”

How about the air conditioning? That would be my suggestion.

The big news in this article is the part where it tells about the new hotel restaurant and bar. The name (and I’m not joking here) of the place is called Cattails. And no it’s not a titty bar. Here is a bit that tells about the menu of Cattails:

The food is described as new American with an infusion of Asian, French, Hispanic and Mediterranean.

“It’s fine food served with a flair in a relaxing atmosphere,” Thompson said.

Some of the house specialties include steak Dianne, chicken Marsala, pork tenderloin thermidore, veal Marsala, chicken Parmesan and pecan crusted chicken. One entree with an intriguing name is “devils on horseback” or sauteed veal scaloppini and cappriccola ham wrapped shrimp.

Flaming desserts also are served and salads prepared table side.

I’m not sure who their target audience is with a selection of fine cuisine like this. But I can tell you I sure as shit won’t eat there. Not with a menu like that. And what the fuck does “new American” mean exactly? Of course me being a “common” employee (peon) I have yet had the opportunity to sample this selection of “house specialties”, which makes it hard for me to recommend Cattails to the guests. They ask me I tell them to go across the street.

One last bit from this piece and I’m done. This is an example of how informed employees are of the goings on at the hotel.

The conference area will be renamed the Rock River Valley Conference Center with each of the five rooms named after the counties which have come together to form marketing strategies, including: Rock County in Wisconsin and in Illinois, Winnebago, Ogle, Stephenson and Boone counties.

News to me. It’s a good thing I read the paper or it may have been ages before I knew about this one. This kind of thing is nothing new. Follow the link at the beginning to get the bits I didn’t cover.

It appears the isp provided to the hotel is picky about what you try to view.

Funny how it lets my site get past it’s blocking filter. I wonder how long it will take for my domain to be blocked?

It’s funny how certain subjects come up more than once. A recent rumor floating around the hotel says that “they” are going to get uniforms for the employees and then take the cost out of the paychecks of the employees. Now this topic was brought to my attention by a few people. I was asked if “they” could do this.

The simple answer is no “they” can’t. The Illinois Department of Labor’s WAGE PAYMENT AND COLLECTION ACT say thats against the law:

Section 300.840 Uniforms Required by an Employer

An employer shall not deduct the cost of purchasing and/or of cleaning uniforms required by the employer from an employee’s wages or final compensation, unless the employee’s express written consent is given freely at the time the deduction is made. Distinctive outfits or accessories, or both, intended to identify the employee with a specific employer shall be considered a uniform. If an employer requires a general type of ordinary basic street clothing to be worn, but permits variations in the detail of dress, this shall not be considered a uniform. However, when an employer requires that an employee purchase street clothes either from the employer or from a third party designated by the employer, the clothing shall be considered a uniform.

So as you can see “they” can’t do this. I want to draw your attention to that last bit there, were it says:

when an employer requires that an employee purchase street clothes either from the employer or from a third party designated by the employer, the clothing shall be considered a uniform.

I bring this up because I asked the Assistant GM about this rumor. She told me this rumor wasn’t true. She said “they” will purchase one uniform for the employee. After that it’s up to us. But this above bit of text here is important. The part were it says “from the employer or from a third party designated by the employer” is something to remember.

If for whatever reason say you need a second uniform and “they” say you have to buy it from So & So Inc. Well guess what? “They” will be purchasing the second uniform as well. And you got to remember to stand up for yourselves. You have to make sure that “they” know that you won’t stand for this bullshit.

To make it easy for you later on when you decide you want to file a complaint against the hotel, I have found the link to the the page with info such as phone number and even the required forms to fill out. Bookmark this page for future reference.

Here is a funny one my Mom sent me.

Dear Employee:

As a result of the reduction of money budgeted for department areas, we are forced to cut down on our number of personnel.

Under this plan, older employees will be asked to take early retirement, thus permitting the retention of younger people who represent our future. Therefore, a program to phase out older personnel by the end of the current fiscal year, via retirement, will be placed into effect immediately.

This program will be known as SLAP (Sever Late-Aged Personnel). Employees who are SLAPPED will be given the opportunity to look for jobs outside the company.

SLAPPED employees can request a review of their employment records before actual retirement takes place. This review phase of the program is called SCREW.

SCREW (Survey of Capabilities of Retired Early Workers). All employees who have been SLAPPED and SCREWED may file an appeal with upper management.

This appeal is called SHAFT (Study by Higher Authority Following Termination).

Under the terms of the new policy, an employee may be SLAPPED once, SCREWED twice, but may be SHAFTED as many times as the company deems appropriate.

If an employee follows the above procedure, he/she will be entitled to get: HERPES (Half Earnings for Retired Personnel’s Early Severance) or CLAP (Combined Lump sum Assistance Payment).

As HERPES and CLAP are considered benefit plans, any employee who has received HERPES or CLAP will no longer be SLAPPED or SCREWED by the company.

Management wishes to assure the younger employees who remain on board that the company will continue its policy of training employees through our:

Special High Intensity Training (SHIT). We take pride in the amount of SHIT our employees receive. We have given our employees more SHIT than any company in this area. If any employee feels they do not receive enough SHIT on the job, see your immediate supervisor.

Your supervisor is specially trained to make sure you receive all the SHIT you can stand.

And, once again, thanks for all your years of service with us.

The funny thing is I bet the hotel would come up with stupid shit like this.

Here’s another thing you may not know about me. I have been collecting business cards for a number of years. Business cards of the people who run the hotel. I have a nice collection going. It started out as a simple thing. I would pick up one here or there. And they would all sit in a pile some where.

The collecting of these business cards didn’t take on a deeper meaning until later in my life as a hotel employee. It wasn’t until I noticed I had a problem with authority. This was around the same time I started to notice that some of these managers were as dumb as a box of rocks. My collection of business cards then took on another meaning.

All of these cards I kept were ways for me to remember all of the assholes who came and went while I was still a peon at the hotel. It’s kind of a game. I don’t ask for a business card or just pick one up until I figure the cards owner has ran out of time at the hotel. It’s kind of like my own way of maintaining a management deadpool.

On occasion I like to look at all of them and note that I’m still at the hotel and they are not. It’s a small personal victory being able to remind myself that I have outlasted all of these people. And with this new bunch of owners/managers I grab these business cards as quick as I can. Sometimes I get lucky and a poor fool just gives me one.

Of course to be fair with this business card deadpool I have going, I always chuck my own business card into the pile whenever I get some. Since I have two in the pile and the rest have one each, I guess my odds are higher. Except I don’t worry about that anymore.

I got this e-mail today. It was absurd enough to put up here. Take a look:

From:Jacinda Pearson
To:webmaster@hotelblues.com
Subject:hotelblues.com

I discovered hotelblues.com in Yahoo, my favorite directory. I am requesting that you create a link from hotelblues.com to my client’s web site if you feel that their content is in some way related or complements your site. In exchange, I’ll post a link from their site to yours.

Exchanging links will help bring in more business for both your web site and my client’s. An added benefit is increased search engine traffic because the search engines rank sites higher that have a good number of relevant links.

This is not a free-for-all link exchange, I don’t waste my time with them and you shouldn’t either. I am only linking to related web sites so that all my links are relevant to my site.

I would like to send you my client’s web address, so that you can review their site. My client is a leading corporate team building and teamwork consulting firm providing fun leadership skills development, management training, and teambuilding programs.

Please let me know if you are interested in exchanging links. I’ll send you more details once I hear back from you.

Looking forward to your reply.

Sincerely,
Jacinda Pearson
jacindapearson@link-builder.com
http://www.link-builder.com

P.S. If for any reason you don’t want me to contact again, just email me and let me know.

The part that says:

My client is a leading corporate team building and teamwork consulting firm providing fun leadership skills development, management training, and teambuilding programs.

That made me laugh. Because it makes me wonder if these assholes even read the sites they send spam out to. Because I wonder if people read Hotelblues.com and think “this guy needs links to sites that are a leading corporate team building and teamwork consulting firm providing fun leadership skills development, management training, and teambuilding programs”. Either this person didn’t read this site or I’m losing my touch.

Of course the site they mention in the e-mail has a faq. Here is what they say about their e-mail being spam:

That is a difficult question to answer because of the many different definitions of SPAM. The first thing to note is that most state laws governing SPAM have to do with advertising for a commercial purpose. Exchanging links hardly falls into that condition. And the federal government has not enacted any SPAM laws governing this condition.

Sounds like they are dodging the question. Spam to me is when someone sends me shit that I didn’t ask for. And that’s what this e-mail is spam. I would e-mail this chick back just to see what her “clients” site was, but I would just be giving them a reason to spam me more.

So last night the hotel had an Employee Appreciation Pool Party. I know it just sounds like a shit load of fun doesn’t it? Well I didn’t get in to the party until the last hour, so I can’t honestly say how it was.

I did grab a few shots of some co-workers. These pictures are of only really three people. My favorite target Stan “Is going to fucking pay for the dog remark” Lee, Jay, and Matt. Stan has been mentioned before on this site. Jay and Matt are the hotels only two regular set up guys and they are both long timers.

The only comment I will make is this. After everyone left I made my way to the frontdesk. Two of the party goers had just come back from te bar across the street. Dave a security guy and the Prince (best nickname I can think up). Part of the reason I went in to the party was to see if the Prince and his buddy (not Dave) would be there. I wanted to get a chance to converse with the guy and get to know him. To see if maybe I was wrong in what I thought of these two people.

So were are all standing at the desk and the Prince asks Dave if he would come join him in the hotel bar. Now I was standing right there. I would have gone down and had a drink with him, if asked. But I guess I’m just not good enough to drink with the Prince.

Oh well. I’m not going to lose no sleep over it. But it just confirms what I think about these people. So it goes.