Priceline

Hey y'all -

I've stayed in some lovely hotels in my time.

Once, I drove from Los Angeles to Montgomery, AL over Thanksgiving, and made a reservation for myself - as a big treat - to spend the night at the Ritz Carlton in New Orleans. Located in the middle of the  French Quarter, it was within walking distance of all sorts of decadence. I had the duck at Emeril's. I had my palm read in Jackson Square - I can't remember what the woman said, but I remember thinking it was freaky deaky and eerily accurate. On my way back to the hotel after my evening spent strolling the Quarter, I had a Hurricane from Pat O'Briens. The last thing I remember from that night was dropping my cell phone into the bubbles of my luxurious marble bathtub as I tried to call my friend Karen to say, "This place is INCREDIBLE."

The Christmas of 1998, I attended the holiday party of the talent agency where I was working (L'chaim!) and they had a prize raffle. My roommate (and co-worker) Brian won a trip for two to New York, including first class airfare and a stay at the Four Seasons. He took me with him, and I will be forever grateful. At the time, we were living together in semi-squalor: a subterranean $500/month apartment in Los Angeles with a hallway that had a series of metal fire doors you had to open on the way to our apartment door (you had to really want groceries to haul those things in from the garage). We were the only non-native Russian speakers, and the only people who didn't make cabbage every night. In contrast, the Four Seasons was immaculate and wonderful. Even my mismatched pink luggage rolling through the lobby could not distract from the magnificence of that hotel. It smelled like the Bulgari Green Tea soap that I stole on the trip and still pull out of a bin in my bathroom in Montana to sniff and remember a magical land where your every need is met, and you never ever have to clean up toddler poop.

Why am I telling you this? Because as fabulous as these hotels were, they STILL cost less per night than the vet clinic where we picked up Gus yesterday and were told, "We have no idea what's wrong, but he seems better now. That'll be $900."

I wish that voodoo woman in New Orleans would have warned me.

Love,

Mom