Those of you who are of the literary persuasion may recognize the title of this post as a reference to the character "Hiro Protagonist" from Neal Stephenson's excellent book
Snow Crash. You would indeed be correct if you speculated that this is where I derived the notion for this title, though you will undoubtedly be disappointed by the far lesser quality of my writing in comparison to Stephenson's. Not that this will, in any way, come as a surprise. Nevertheless, we must press forward as we always do.
I do not mean, however, to refer to Hiro, the protagonist of Stephenson's story, but rather to HyRo, who is the antagonist of my own. I refer, of course, to my
Hypothetical
Roommate here, who can be abbreviated as HyRo in a move to save my poor aching fingers from having to type such a long-ass nickname every time I refer to him. In any case, HyRo has been harassing me for some time to write a very particular blog post. He has asked during walks to the student union, "When are you going to write that Travelocity post?" He has asked at random moments in our office, "When are you going to write that Travelocity post?" He has asked during his infrequent visits to our (?) apartment, "When are you going to write that Travelocity post?" Doubtless, when he sees this, he will ask me: "When are you going to write that Travelocity post?" Given how long he's been asking me, since the
incident during which I first said I would write a post about Travelocity (back in February), I think I should finally answer HyRo's query. And that answer is this:
Right goddamn
now you goat-fucker! Now will you
please shut the hell up?! I'm tempted to tell everyone that one really embarrassing story just to pay you back for months of acute annoyance! And you goddamn well
know what story I mean, as does everyone who goes to the sports bar with us. Don't make me explain, you won't like it.
But I digress...
I have, indeed, been meaning to write a post for some time about the bargain travel website
Travelocity. This website- HyRo, my officemate, and I have discovered- is an excellent way to economize on travel expenses. An excellent way, that is, assuming that you don't mind being ass-rammed by a faceless bureaucracy with no more concern for your well-being than a tiger has for a lamb with a steak stabled to its forehead.
For the staggeringly simple-minded in the audience, that isn't very much.
I say this because of an uncomfortable discovery we made. During our recent Misery Journey we stayed in the Ramadan hotel. Okay, technically it was a
Ramada, but I do enjoy renaming things from time to time. In any case, we made arranagements for four people to stay in the relevant Remadan near the destination of our misery journey. These arrangements were made through, as you might have guessed, Travelocity.
Unfortunately, as it turns out, Travelocity didn't make those arrangements. It made arrangements for
two of us to stay there, pocketed the excess cash, and left us to work out the situation with several irate
hoteliers. You see, as I said, Travelocity is a very economical way to make travel plans, but it appears that this is because Travelocity doesn't necessarily make the plans you think it's making. It may, in fact, make an entirely different set of plans and take the money you thought was destined for something else. I'm not business man, nor a lawyer, but I'm pretty sure they refer to that as
fraud. Let me repeat that, I think the term "Fraud," defined as, "A deception deliberately practiced in order to secure unfair or unlawful gain," applies in a situation where a company offers to sell a particular item, accepts money for aforementioned item, and then, and this is the critical part, doesn't provide said item. I wouldn't be very upset about this but, as it turns out, Hoteliers can be quite pissy.
So, take it from me, and HyRo, and my officemate: if you must travel, don't use Travelocity. Instead, if you must use a website, use
Expedia, or
Sidestep, or, if you're a fan of
William Shatner, go with
Priceline. Just don't go with Travelocity.
Unless, of course, like HyRo, you enjoy anal sex with Hoteliers. Man, if it hadn't been for HyRo and his amazing
colon, we would have been sleeping outdoors.
Thanks again, Buddy.