Strange Things are Afoot at the **** Inn....

Well, tonight was eventful... Around 3:30, I'm sitting here, watching Heroes and playing on my Japanese game. Suddenly there's this kid, couldn't be over 16 (She had braces for Pete's sake!), tugging on the lobby door, bawling her eyes out and wanting to make a telephone call. I can smell alcohol through the service window, so I'm pretty sure she's drunk. I explain that I'm not allowed to unlock the doors, but offer to make the call for her. She has me call her friend first (no answer), then her grandmother, who's two bloody counties over, begging for a ride. I manage to get ahold of the Grandmother, and they say they're on their way. The girl sits down to wait in the little entryway just outside of the lobby, and I go into the back room to see if there are any blankets or something I could give her, since it's chilly out and she's wearing nothing but a t-shirt.

I get back, and the kid's not there. I pause for a few minutes, try to look out the window for her, then put my coat on and actually venture out to at least check around the corners of the building. Nothing. So, I do the only thing I can think of doing, when there's a crying drunk kid wandering around in the middle of the night and her grandmother's on the way: I call the police, explain everything, and ask them to send a car out to look for her.

I get five of them. Around then, the grandparents show up, and I have to explain everything that'd happened since the phone call to them. Turns out, not only is this girl not even 16. She's 14. So, everyone's looking for this kid, when the grandmother gets ahold of the kid's mom. The mom says the kid made it home. Everything gets called off, the grandparents go home. Then I get a call from the police asking if a particular person was checked in. It turns out the mother is checked in here...

So, lots of hubub, and the kid was staying here with her Mom... But I'd still like to know why the mother said they were home. And why a 14-year-old girl showed up at my lobby at 3:30 in the morning, reeking of liquer and crying her eyes out, two counties away from home on a school night. This really doesn't make sense. I can't help but think there's something really wrong going on, there... :-/

Zowie!!!

She comes out onto the stage. She looks a bit like my grandmother. She banters a bit with the judges, about her huge dreams, which no one in the audience expects she can fulfill...

Then she starts to sing.

I clearly need to watch more British television. :-|