You Reckon?

I don’t know if we were just so glad to be out of the car after traveling for two days or if we were totally excited to be heading to our room overlooking the ocean, but when we got to Virginia Beach on our recent trip, we had a very funny incident.

We were staying at the Virginia Beach Resort which was right on the Chesapeake Bay. We pulled up, checked in at the reception desk, got our room keys and were told we could park in the parking garage and take the elevators from there up to our floor. So we parked our car and opened the trunk and stared at the multitude of items that we had packed. We weren't sure where to begin, but Wayne, eager, as we all were, to get settled into our room, suggested that we try to take everything up in one trip. I just sort of looked at him and thought… ok – we can try…

Now you have to realize that I alone had not only my suitcase and toiletry bag, but also my purse, book bag, camera bag and lap top. We also had two more suitcases, a shoe bag, a beach bag, Spencer’s electronics bag (with, IPod, game boy and games, various head phones and a couple of movies), two pillows, a couple of blankets, beach towels, a beach umbrella, a soft-sided cooler and a couple of bags of food. No problem (lol)!

We actually did very well, clearing out all but a couple of small things from our car, and headed towards the elevator. We barely made it there but managed to get to the door only to realize that we needed our electronic key card to get into the small lobby off the parking lot, which involved putting down half of what I was carrying to get it out of my purse. This was done with a bit of difficulty, but before long we were jamming ourselves and all our belongings into the elevator. We hit the 4^th floor button and before we knew it the door opened to our floor. After a bit of a struggle to once again pick up all our bags, one by one we squeezed/fell out of the elevator which then allowed the family that was patiently waiting, to get on the elevator.

Whew! We were almost there! We didn’t see any signs that pointed us in the direction of our room, so we turned left and started walking. All that was there was the restaurant and some meeting rooms. Obviously we went the wrong way. So we turned around and went down the hall in the other direction. We found the pool and the fitness center but still could not find our rooms. At this time I didn’t think my arms could take the weight of my bags much longer, so when I saw a hotel employee I walked over and asked where room 424 was. She looked at me with a very odd look, raised one eyebrow and said, “Uh – on the 4^th floor!”

OH MY GOSH – we had exited the elevator on the 1^st floor – not the fourth!! We were so embarrassed and so tired and realized how we must have looked, so we quickly went back to the elevator and pushed the up button! Once again we had to jam ourselves back into the elevator and just as the door closed we all broke out in a fit of laughter that was totally uncontrollable! Between the first and fourth floor, we laughed so hard that we could barely breathe! I had tears running down my cheeks (as did Spencer) and when the elevator finally opened on the fourth floor I had no energy left to pick up the 20 bags I was carrying! But, wouldn’t you know it, a family was waiting to get on, so we had to somehow pick up all our stuff and once again exit the elevator. Spencer and I were hysterically laughing the entire time (Wayne was able to regain some composure at this point) and I am sure that poor family was wondering what the heck was wrong with us! We laughed all the way to our room and when we finally go into our room we just dropped all our stuff and continued laughing!

We have laughed about that day every day since. Seriously, we looked like we were in a Chevy Chase movie! Maybe you would have had to have been there to totally appreciate the humor in this story, but all I can think of is that famous saying: You can dress them up, but you can’t take them out!

Have a blessed day!