The World’s Coffeemaker

That's actually the early Holiday Inn sign, isn't it? Copyright! Copyright! Lawsuit! Lawsuit! Whoop whoop whoop! Danger, Will Robinson!

Yep.

James, thank you so much for taking me back in time to when we first came to America from England in 1982. We lived in the Holiday Inn for a whole month while we looked for our new Home.
Everything was so new and exotic to an English person: firstly comfort and convenience ( pretty much unknown in my experience of English hotels), people helping themselves to enormous portions in the restaurant and then going back for more, lovely, kind waitresses who called me “Honey”, giant basketball players so tall that they had to avoid hitting their heads on the light fixtures, a machine in the hallway which dispensed ice cubes for free, a parking lot full of glamorous cars just like in the movies, people in cars slowing down to check on me when I was taking the toddler and baby on their daily constitutional with not a single other soul out walking on the sidewalks, bright red cardinal birds in the landscape which I thought must be escaped parrots, Mikesell’s potato chips with enough in one bag for a whole family for a month, most of all the warmest most welcoming people . Heavenly.

In Nepal, they add an s and think nobody will notice. Believe me, if you go in, you’ll notice.

We drove across the USA (southern California to east coast Florida) in 1965 (a move for my father’s new job). We stayed exclusively at Holiday Inn hotels for three reasons: 1) consistency of features (the move itself was enough adventure; our mother didn’t want to wonder what our hotel room might include); 2) a pool (9 year old me and 7 year old brother had a lot of pent up energy to burn off after riding in the backseat of a 1965 Mustang all day); and 3) the Holiday Inn chain had a reservation system through which our parents could, from the Holiday Inn hotel in which we were staying one night, make a reservation for the next night at another Holiday Inn down the road without having to make an expensive long distance telephone call.

The town in which we now live (north Texas, with an interstate highway running along the southern edge of town) has no “high end” hotels, but plenty of the mid-priced (Comfort Suites, La Quinta, Hampton Inn type) and more budget national chain hotels (Motel 6, Super 8). But right next to the highway (and tucked into a corner of a large truck stop) is the “Sleep ‘n’ Go” motel. Although I have never stayed there, I have seen its contents. Talk about lack of amenities! But then the name tells you that it pretends to be nothing more than a place for you to get some sleep and then hit the road again. No lobby. The rooms are tiny with a bed, one upright chair, a wall-mounted television, and a tiny basic bathroom. No desk. No bureau or chest of drawers. No closet. Though the rooms do have a small refrigerator and a microwave. But no coffee maker.