Off to a Rough Start

Anyone who knows me, knows that the past 1-2 years has been rough when it came to having a truly enjoyable, relaxing vacation. It just seemed like despite all the best laid plans and hope, the trip would in some way involve stress and disappointment. This vacation did not get off to an auspicious start.

Last year in lieu of our traditional week in Palm Desert, we went to Puerto Rico which goes down in my mind as our worst vacation to date. So I've been waiting 2 years to get back to the desert, a place where I have good memories of relaxation and unstructured fun. We got a couple of phone calls from the resort over the past few weeks, asking for checking preferences, condo location preferences, so I had high hopes.

They offered checkin at the gate rather than getting out of the car and I thought "cool!" plus they were letting us chicken early which is always good considering I.'s early bedtime. So I pulled up to the gate - no checkin packet is there for us so off we go to get out of e car and checkin. Uhoh. Then the condo is not ready and since we have $200 worth of groceries in the car and it's 99 degrees, I ask what else they have on a top floor that is ready. Sure they say and off we go. We grab a load of stuff and then discover that the room numbers they gavels are not valid for the building number we are supposedly in. Thank God for cell phones - I call up to the front desk again and get the "real" room numbers which do not remotely resemble the actual room numbers. Huh?

We finally get everything in the units after many trips upstairs in this heat and I get I. Into the bath. I haven't gotten a chance to look outside yet so I go to the window expecting the normal, serene golf course view that I have relished for e past 6 years. I mean, this view is the highlight of the early evening hours for me. I ggo outside with a couple of books, an adult beverage (obviously not this year), and I just relax in the warmth and read. This is my idea of a vacation.

Except when I look outside this year, I see a bunch of people sitting around a pool and an asphalt parking lot. WTF?! I won't repeat what came out of my mouth and kept coming out of my mouth for several minutes. Let's just say it was a good thing that I. Was in the bath. Then I went into the other bathroom, sat on the edge of the tub, and sobbed. Like I said, not an auspicious start.

Part 2 "the redemption" to come...