Crappy Cartoon Theatre By Jirr Burns: Stuff I Saw When I Did Bear Shaving Patrol

Before I begin I have an announcement. People, when you stay at a hotel, watch what happens with your hair. When you shave, brush it, whatever. From working in a hotel, I've seen more hair in a bathroom than what's on my head. Sometimes it's like Merida, Sulley and Cousin It stayed in one room and had a party.

I also have a theory that there is an underground sport of bear shaving taking place in hotels across the country. It's better than accepting the reality that it's probably some old, morbidly obese man suffering a midlife crisis that is shaving his gorilla back hair in order to look good for his call girl.

The higher you get it on the walls, the more points you earn.

Housekeeping should really be called Bear Shaving Patrol Force.

Now onto the other crap...

Whether it's a 5 star hotel or the La Quinta, I don't care. I've cleaned both of them and from what I've seen, they're cleaned the same way. 5 star hotels are cleaned immaculately because they have an image to uphold. Your average "Just passin' through/my car broke down/ the misses is angry at me again" places are also cleaned immaculately because they want to be that 5 star hotel. And actually, the average one I worked at was cleaner than the luxury resort!

And no matter where you work in housekeeping, you're going to see some crazy crapola in the rooms. Such as-

The family came back for it and it turns out it belonged to a 16 year old something boy. His face was a bold shade of red. I felt bad for him. His crazy ass girlfriend probably made him take it and he tried desperately to get rid of the thing.

The pic above has a good story with it. I had accepted another job outside of hospitality and I think there's a universal law that whenever it's your last day at a job, shit hits the fan. In hospitality, it happens literally.

The housekeeping manager went into rooms that day to strip beds and get towels because we had a lot to clean that day. She goes into the stay over (people who aren't checking out) across the hall from the room I was in. I heard her exclaim,

".....AWWWWWW SHIIIIIIIIIT."

I went over to inspect since it was one of my rooms anyway. The moment I walked in, it reeked of love berries and shame. There was a note left on the closed toilet that said- and I cannot make this up-

The manager and I exchanged a look and we knew deep in our souls we were both thinking "I ain't touchin' that."

So we call up our maintenance guy to take a look. We warned him about the smell but no one had a clue what lurked beyond the lid. I mean, we knew *what* it was. We just didn't want to see how much.

The manager had left to keep stripping sheets off beds. I went back to my room to finish up. Maintenance guy comes with a plunger, wearing rubber gloves, and a look of fear. He goes in, I hear the door close, the bathroom door open, the porcelain tap of the toilet lid opening and then- well you saw it in the drawing.

After flushing about 6 times, he exited the room a broken man. He looked like he aged 15 years. As he stomped his way out with the last lingering bits of dignity clinging to his person, he told me, "That makes it in top 3. That's one of the worst things I've ever seen in this hotel!"

I go in there, feeling scared, and even though it still smelled a little ripe, that toilet looked awesome. That maintenance man was a hero that day, not just for the guest but for me too.

The grossest thing I've personally seen which tops the toilet, toenails in a jacuzzi and the day after Valentine's Day is..... ugh, I can smell the guy just thinking about it.....

The topical male testosterone.

There was this 50 something year old mustachioed man who was staying in the area for his whatever-the-hell-business. He didn't give two craps about the rest of the staff but he was always uber friendly with me. Like friendly to the point I would scan the room for the nearest object to defend myself with.

He was there 2 days and that was plenty enough exposure for me.

And he always stank like weasel musk.

And he remembered my name.

And on his last day in the hotel, he asked "as a friend" if I ever wanted to do lunch. This was before I knew the Jenna Marbles face (look it up if you don't know it!) so I just told him I had another job and I spend my free time with my Search and Rescue Swimmer Navy boyfriend I barely get to see. He backed off a bit when I said that. He shook my hand, parted ways, and I made sure as he was walking down the hall he heard and saw this-

And of course I had to clean his room after he checked out because the universe hates me. And what I found in the bathroom. Well, let's just say when I found that... (jibblies) cream, I ran it to the lost and found for all the staff to see and then I cleaned and de-weasel musked the shit out of it to the point I would eat a rack of ribs directly off the shower floor and even lick the sauce up.

That's the universe laughing at me in the corner while I think to myself, "Why me god?"

Fortunately, I got out of housekeeping and got a good job as a secretary and selling hot tubs for a family owned store. That has its own set of stories, but not as nasty. I'll save those for another time.

I'll end this with a comic strip about the vacuum I used for cleaning.