Being understaffed at work continues to push me to my limit. By two o'clock Friday afternoon I was on the edge of hysteria. I couldn't decide between laughter or tears, so I jumped up and walked rapidly around the office several times. Since this involved zigzagging around five other agents' desks placed in a random pattern throughout the office while dodging a large dog kennel (sans dog), several rubber bones, a precariously balanced pile of outgoing mail, the sharp edges of filing cabinets and shelves holding teetering mounds of brochures, and a chair placed in the middle of the doorway to the back room, I was calm and clear-headed by the time I made my way through the obtacle course. Featly avoiding dog toys while completing the 50-yard dash is wonderfully clearing to the brain.
My day was brightened shortly thereafter by an elderly client who banged on our front door with her cane. It's a glass door. It's also not locked, but she was perfectly happy to whap on the glass instead of trying to push it open, so I jumped up and let her in. She had the greatest hairdo I ever hope to see this side of the deep south. It looked like she'd wrapped a loaf of bread in an old shower curtain, sewed big, gauzy, black ribbons all over it, and then secured it with a thousand bobby pins on top of her own pouffed out grey hair to form a sort of figure 8. It was an amazing piece of hair architecture. I can't imagine how she sleeps in it.
I asked if I could help her. She brushed me right off and made a beeline for the busiest agent in the room. I laughed when I saw Ruth's face as this antique sat down with grim determination and started to tell her all about her vacation plans. There are certain clients whom you know will be major time wasters, wanting to pick your brain for all possible information on a variety of destinations, and then take armfuls of brochures home without any real intention of booking a trip with you. We call them shoppers, and our job is to turn them into buyers. It's time-consuming, though, and you have to be willing to ruthlessly cut them loose as soon as you determine they aren't really in the market for a vacation. I stopped laughing when Ruth promptly said, "Lucy will help you. She knows all about spas in Europe." Thanks a lot, Ruth.
The client sat down at my desk, and announced imperiously that she wanted to go to a town called Baden Baden for a month. "Really? An entire month?" I replied with just a hint of dubiousness in my voice. I mean, there's not that many spa treatments to get through, and there's nothing else to do in Baden Baden but climb mountains and go skiing which I was fairly certain she didn't intend to do. Yes, a month, she was sure. So I handed her our brochure on the various spas in that area. She looked affronted.
"This," she said in dire tones, "is in Germany." Her hairbows shook a little.
"Yes, ma'am," I agreed. "Baden Baden is in Germany."
"I want to go to Baden Baden, Austria. I only go to Austrian spas." A bobby pin sprang loose. I picked it up for her.
"There is no Baden Baden in Austria, ma'am," I replied. "But I'm sure I can find you a lovely spa hotel at Baden. It's right outside Vienna."
"No," she said. She gave me a steely look.
No? No what? Facts are facts; there is a Baden, Austria, but no Baden Baden. Telling your elderly client she's gotten her Badens mixed up is not easy, though, especially when she's got that cane in whappable reach. "Let me show you this highly detailed Michelin map of Europe, ma'am. See? Here's Baden. And here's a listing in the spa magazine. The hotel is lovely. Would you like to stay there, perhaps?"
"No. I want to go to Baden Baden." I felt my heart drop into my shoes. Oh, boy.
"I'm so sorry, but there is no Baden Baden, Austria. What about near Salzburg? There are some very nice spa resorts in that area. Look at this photo. Isn't that a magnificent hotel?"
She looked at it with a hint of interest. "I'm meeting my brother in Wien, and we want to go to Baden Baden. What else do you have?"
I showed her some photos of Austrian spas. Then I showed her some photos of Swiss spas. Then, getting desperate because the phones were ringing off the hook with actual paying customers trying to book flights, I showed her our sole brochure on Hungarian spas. She thumbed through it for a minute. "No. I want Baden Baden. I hear there is a very good spa there. That's what I want."
Twenty minutes of this. I finally got tough. "Ma'am, I've explained several times that there is no Baden Baden, Austria, and shown you this very fine map's index over and over. You can simply believe me now and we can find you a place to stay, or you can go home and research it on your own. What would you like to do?"
"Oh," she said with a perfectly genuine smile. "All right. My brother has already booked us a place at Baden. I just thought I'd see if I could do any better. I'll take this brochure with me, and maybe I'll call you later." And she teetered out the door, hair barely clearing the top.
Because I am a mature woman, and an experienced travel agent, I didn't throw the rubber dog bone at the door until she was out of sight.
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