Writing in Tacoma
Day 94 – July 3, 2003 – Thursday
Today was a writing day. I spent the day in Tacoma and Seattle just writing and working on the website updates. I added photos to most of the days since June 27.
The staff of the Comfort Inn was really delightful. Fatima was the General Manager, and she has personality plus! Leehanna was the Desk Clerk there this morning, and I enjoyed speaking with her.
I did go see the Western State Mental Hospital today; it was recommended by Desiree as the most unique sight to see in the Tacoma area. Photography was not allowed. Western State Hospital is an infamous facility where movie star Frances Farmer was allegedly raped, shocked, and brutalized. See http://www.cchr.org/art/eng/page34.htm for the story. I was also told that Stephen King spent some time there to do research. It certainly ranks as one of the more unusual places to visit on the trip. I was pleased that the radio folks from South Bend, Indiana didn’t call me for another interview today.
I saw Fort Steilacoom in Tacoma.
I went to the airport and picked up the sweetest, most beautiful, and most wonderful woman in the world, my lovely wife and ace navigator, Bozzie.
It is just 60 miles or so from Tacoma to Seattle, so it didn’t take long to get there. It did, however, take five calls to the Marriott Courtyard on Westlake in Seattle to finally get the directions needed to get to their hotel. I made three laps of about 20 miles. The service was so bad at the Marriott that I checked out within an hour. A faceless Marriott person named Jerry is the rudest person I have ever come in contact with at a hotel. Marriott Courtyard on Westlake in Seattle — avoid it.
So, we moved to the Doubletree Hotel at the Seattle-Tacoma airport. Huge hotel, and the staff is really nice. As an extra added plus, there was a big Science Fiction Convention taking place at the hotel.
I met Mary at the hotel. She was a flight attendant for Delta. She was on the way to South Bend, Indiana to spend the Fourth of July with her husband.
When training salespeople and customer service people over the years, I have always stressed the importance of being nice to customers and prospective customers. People like to do business with people they like. I believe it is the most important lesson in salesmanship or customer service. The lesson of the day is to never hire a Jerry; never allow a rude person to work in sales or customer service. Some people do not deal with questions well. Some people do not deal with stress well. Some people are rude to everyone. Those people do not belong in customer service positions.
Random Comments:
Bozzie Jane and I fly to Anchorage tomorrow!
The Daily Journal of Round America:
Each day, we collect our thoughts on a web page just like this. We drop in some of the photos from the day. Our goal with the Daily Journal is to write about the towns we visit, the sights we see, the people we meet, and the pie we eat. We write about where we are, where we’ve been, and where we are going, but we also make observations about what we’ve seen and done as well as about life in general.
You can follow our travels from the Daily Journal section of this website. Other pages of interest include the running report of “vital statistics” on the Trip Scorecard, our nominations for the Best & Worst of the trip, as well as a rating of the pie we eat. If you’d like to see information for a specific state or town, click here, and then click on the state of interest, and the full itinerary is shown.