The W Hotel, Chicago

There is an interesting thing about the W hotel in Chicago. Their card keys look substantially similar to the CTA transit cards.

As good environmentally aware citizens, yesterday we took the train in to the city from O'Hare airport. We had to buy a transit card, put some money on it, and it worked like a charm. (We won't take the train back as they are working on the tracks Sunday)

We got to our nice hotel, wandered around the city (more about that later), met Matt, Laurie, Amy, and Sara for drinks, dinner, and a show (The Addams Family. More about that later, too) and then headed back to our hotel. (We walked part of the way, and then grabbed a taxi. The hearty Northerners walked further than we did. I cannot testify to the fact that they walked all the way back to their hotel (that would have been a long walk), but I can say that they were still walking when we got into the cab.

We got back to our hotel (which was hosting a Ford Model's Christmas party. The girls, not the cars) and it was a happening place. They take security seriously here (we'll see about that) so you need to use your room key card to get the elevator to work.

But as in most hotels that use a system like that, one key will open almost all the floors.

So we were jammed into the elevator, and someone else punched "17" for us.

And when we got to our room, I realized that I did not have our room key, but our CTA card.

Very funny.

So we had to go back to the front desk and explain the situation.

Except that my name was not on the reservation as Doreen had made the arrangements. And Doreen and I have different last names. And Doreen did not bring her ID with her that evening.

The kids at the desk were very nice and friendly, and said they would get security to go up to the room with us, and we could show him her ID there.

Except that her ID was in the safe. And the safe failed when we tried to open it.

So they had to send for maintenance to open the safe.

By this time, James, from security, said he believed us and let us stay, while we waited for maintenance to come and open the safe.

I told Doreen we should have waited for the shift change (James helpfully told us he was working until 2:00 AM) and then called down and say we had been robbed, and the safe was empty.

She didn't think that was as funny as I did.