No Shmeservations

Call me a traditionalist.  Call me practical.  Call me...I don't know...a word that describes someone who follows and abides by the rules of life in the silly, naive, seemingly unfounded hope that his actions make easier either his or someone else's journey across this all-too-short bridge to the great unknown?

Call me any descriptor of that ilk that you will, but I feel that there are certain things in this life that are unflinchingly rigid.  Or, at least, should be.  And one of those things are reservations.  Yesterday, however, I was informed otherwise.

We bussed into Edinburgh yesterday morning with high spirits and overflowing anticipation to see the sites, the city, the people, and of course, the pure, distilled insanity that is the Fringe festival.  The ride there was partially rainy and partially sunny (as is the weather in Scotland...sometimes, oddly, at the same time), and concluded with a 20-minute long conversation with a lovely older Scottish lass during which I was turned around in my seat nodding and smiling as she went on and on about SWEET-MOSES-KNOWS-WHAT B/C I COULDN'T UNDERSTAND A DAMN WORD SHE WAS SAYING (but, bless her heart, she was adorable).  We arrived at St. Andrews' Square, but you just as easily could have mistaken it for Times Square by how many people were squeezing their way down Edinburgh's narrow roads.

We navigated our way to the Royal Mile (covered with street performers doing everything from acrobatics to...well...a dancing man in a tuxedo with the head of a fish), found Blair Street, hung a right on Cowgate and soon arrived at the Cowgate Tourist Hostel, which looked fine and unassuming from the outside and lobby area.  That is where we met George.

George seemed to be a nice enough chap...slightly spiky hair, chops, a piercing or two, random punk rock shirt, fun little accent.  We presented George with our printed, confirmed, RESERVATION (cf. Shmeservation - (def.) a hollow promise given by jerks).  George proceeded to inform us that while our shmeservation was good, we would not be in the same room.  The conversation went SOMETHING like this:

JFro: Well, hididdlyho there, my good man.  We have a reservation to stay at your fine establishment .
George: Right...so...we have you two here, but not in the same room...
J: Excuse me?
G: We're unable to put you in the same room.   Because you made your [shmeservation] after the people who checked in before you, they have first priority.
J: But, George, our RESERVATION clearly says we're supposed to have 2 beds in a 4-bed room.
G: Right
J:
G: But you made them late, so we put other people in the room first and we have to split you two up.
J: Ok, George, I think there might be a miscommunication here.  See, we made a RESERVATION to be in the same room.  The key to the whole reservation system lies in the ability of the reservation HOLDER to eventually stay in the room in which they have made a reservation.  THAT'S WHAT A RESERVATION DOES.  Otherwise, the reservation loses its potency.  It becomes a meager request.  But this isn't a meager request, IS IT, GEORGE??  NO.  This is a RESERVATION.  So what can we do about this?
G: Nothing, unfortunately.  There's no more room anywhere else.
J:  Ok, George, let's examine this situation one more time...

You can imagine how the conversation continued.  Obviously, as I'm sure you have inferred from the beginning of this post, George won this battle.  And, because the Fringe is going on, there are no other vacancies in town.  Literally.  I, however, am content in knowing that I will prove victorious in the WAR...if by no other means than verbally bashing this Euro-HOLE to the six people that regularly read my blog.  Do NOT stay at the Cowgate Tourist Hostel in Edinburgh, Scotland.  It is a dump sandwich.  Dirty as hell, half of the lights/outlets/appliances don't work properly or at all.  The beds are little more than coils wrapped in thin fabric (I got into bed last night and thought I was lying on my cell phone, until I realized it was on my bag next to the bed...).  Everytime I flush my toilet it sounds like a NASA shuttle launch.  Jaime's room smells like Gary Busey looks.  But, on top of it all, the staff doesn't think twice about honoring their previously made commitments.  And that, my dear friends, is just not right.

This is why my post is entitled "No Shmeservations"...as in, "reservations, shmeservations"...as in, "I don't give a rat's ass about what you THOUGHT/WERE TOLD/PAID FOR, you're getting what I want to give you because you're between a rock and a hard place, you hairy Yank."