Fun Night

The hotel was robbed tonight. No one was hurt, including, unfortunately, the robbers. They didn't get much. Mostly, the people who will be hurt by this are future customers who want to check in when I am here. I'll be locking the doors when I arrive. People will not be coming in to get brochures, coffee, or use the microwave. Sorry, I'm not leaving the door open. The lobby is closed.

The police are really no help. They make you fill out some forms and leave a mess to clean up after dusting for fingerprints. He told me to keep the door locked and call them anytime I'm not comfortable with someone. That's not really practical.

I'm not really sure what I'm going to do. I don't want to lock everyone out but invariably, when I open the door for someone another person will pop up right behind wanting to be let in. Some people are obviously not a threat but for many you just can't tell.

Perhaps it's time to leave this job. I worked at another hotel years ago and got robbed. They kept coming back at different times. They even came back when I was there once but I had the door locked. The police, again, were no help. They try but they are at a disadvantage to begin with. The owner of the hotel hired an armed off-duty policeman to guard the property and I stopped by and talked with him while he was working with my relief and it quickly became obvious that if the robbers came back while he was there he would become a victim too because he is not gonna have time to get his gun out without being shot first by the guys already pointing guns at him. Surely if I were a robber I wouldn't let him get to his gun and I would assume he had one.

I know one thing, anyone using a gun to commit a crime needs the death penalty. Period. No anger, no hate, no revenge. Just something that needs to be done - take them out of society permanently - so the rest of us can live in peace.