Anonymous Food

So, I'm sitting in my hotel room feeling peckish. Lacking the energy to go downstairs and actually find some food, I turn to the room service menu. It is very decadent, but the prices are reasonable and the menu inviting, so I ring up and order a sandwich and some chips. "Fifteen minutes" says the man. "Fine" I reply.

Fifteen minutes go by. then another fifteen minutes. No food. We english have a problem with complaining. We hardly ever do. Anyhoo, after 45 minutes hunger gets the better of me and I ring back.

The chap on the other end of the phone assures me that the food is on its way even as we speak. At the end of the call, almost as an aside, he asks "What room are you in?".

The penny drops. When I called the first time I assumed the hotel had one of those fangled things where the phone system tells the receptionist who is calling. The first time I experienced this it was really scary. I was jetlagged in a hotel and at 3:00 am I rang up to ask for a network cable so that I could connect to some people who were as awake as I seemed to be. "Good morning Mr. Miles" said the person at the other end. "Have we met?" I blurted out, before I figured out what was going on. This caused much confusion at the other end, as the poor desk porter tried to figure out why someone would ring them up at 3:00 to find out if they had met them. Anyhoo, I digress.

The first time I called for my food it did not occur to me to tell the chap at the other end where I was. Which gave them a problem.  They had a beef sandwich and a plate of chips and no idea of where to send them. All the could do was wait until I rang back and complained, which with me being english, took a while.

The good news is that the food was excellent.