After many fits and starts and stops, we made it to the Hot Springs, AR, Country Inn and Suites. Nice enough place, but the pool closes at 10pm (instead of midnight, like most of the Inns), and opens at 9am (instead of 6am, ditto). I programmed in Country Inn and Suites, Hot Springs, and the GPS snaked us all over rural Arkansas, enventually taking us to a vacant lot on a state hwy about 10 or 11 miles south of Hot Springs. I got much better results when I programmed in the actual street address.
I was going to do this post about half an hour ago, while Bob "negotiated" with the adolescents about sleeping slots. Carly and Jamie both wanted to set up a cot under the window by the AC unit. To complicate things, Bob requested a fold-out bed. I went in the room to drop off the chocolate that I didn't want to have melt in the car, and Bob was flipping coins. That was when I grabbed the netbook and headed to the breakfast room. The signal here is really low, and I was having trouble connecting. Bob came out, and, as usual, asked me to tidy up the negotiations, while he remedied the computer issues. Carly was sitting on her suitcase, pouting, next the the folded out fold-out, which almost completely blocked access to the bathroom. Jamie was insisting that the fold-out would fit by the window/AC unit which would make Carly happy and he would sleep on his cot by the bathroom (which was what Carly wanted in the first place, expecting to use her cot, which would have saved us the fee for the fold-out. I'm so confused!) Carly was sure it wouldn't fit. I did a rapid assessment, and told her it would fit. The only problem was the armchair in that space, which Jamie picked up and started waving around, though there was no place to put it down.
The long and the short is: Carly is sleeping in the fold-out (not her cot), by the window. We moved the armchair over near the bathroom, but not close enough to block same. Billy has the second bed. Jamie is sleeping on a cot next to the bathroom. I came back to the breakfast area and I got my computer connected to the appropriate network. And I probably have another ulcer for my gastroenterologist to find at my next EGD.
Tomorrow is another day. Time to find a Starbucks.
