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Mr. Etiquette's Pop Quiz
The Occidental Tourist · November 22, 2002

By now, loyal Ticked.com readers, you could very well be confused over the various protocols when it comes to proper behavior on the road. So, once again, the Tourist steps in as Mr. Travel Etiquette, offering this simple quiz to test your knowledge:

1. True or false: When on vacation at a beach rental, go with the flow when problems arise. Nothing's perfect. And complaining about it simply isn't 'the beach way of life.'

The answer, of course, is 'false.' That's 'false,' 'false,' and 'false.' Beach rental companies are notoriously laid back. Laid back, that is, when it comes to ensuring that the home has decent plumbing, working appliances and door handles that don't end up on the floor upon entering the building. THAT'S when they're extremely laid back. But threaten to withhold something like, oh say, their money, and you find that they suddenly lose that oh-so-charmingly serene MO.

In renting a beachside property in Rehoboth, Del., the Tourist and his family discovered that the main sliding glass door was off its frame. It essentially could be opened by anyone, including felons. Now, you'd think the management company's response would be 'We're shocked to even ALLOW a guest into a home with such disrepair, and we're going to fix it right away!' But, ha ha, that demonstrates what a naive rube you are!

Upon reporting the problem when moving in on a Saturday, the Tourist got this response from the management company: 'Oh. Really? That's too bad. But we don't have a maintenance person to fix it today. You'll have to wait until Monday.' Given that we were there with another couple - with three kids between us - and CNN these days appears to broadcast a new child kidnapping every half-hour, the Tourist responded less than 'beach way'-edly: Get somebody from your company over here pronto with a toolbox or I'm going to make your life miserable - not to mention get a huge rebate for my trouble.

Suffice to say, the management company somehow came up with a human being who actually possessed a toolbox and actually knew how to secure the door. Problem solved - by not taking 'the beach way' for an answer.

2. After enjoying the crisp beach air with a cigarette, you should:

A. Swallow the butt.
B. Toss it in the ocean so fish can play with it.
C. Leave it on the beach so kids can play with it.

The answer, according to a vast majority of smokers, is apparently C. Why, what's a better way to enjoy the ocean's natural wonder than by lighting up a dozen cigs and leaving it there in the sand? The Tourist relishes nothing better than having his toddler son pick up butts in Ocean City and put them in his mouth. What a heartwarming scene. Now, as for choices A and B, we're sure that smokers would find both equally repulsive. (Well, A for sure. Since it would directly affect them and we all know that smokers, if anything, are very in tune with THEIR needs.) But to the rest of us, C is equally obnoxious. To play off the old saying: Don't leave cigarette butts on our beach. Do we dump sand in your ashtray?

3. When a hotel advertises something - even something as trivial as Nintendo games on the TV - and it fails to deliver, you should:

A. Shrug to your kids and say 'See? Life isn't fair.'
B. Play the pay-per-view porn movies for the youngsters instead
C. Raise a stink and get what the hotel advertised for - and more

The answer is C. Staying at the Hampton Inn in downtown Indianapolis, the Tourist was looking forward to unwinding with a few adult beverages and the game system when he discovered that, somehow, he ended up in what apparently was the only room in the building without a system. So he called it in. (Sucking up the embarrassing disclosure that he was, yes, a grown adult who enjoyed video games. But, hey, the Tourist's missus vastly prefers that addiction to, say, day trading or illegal narcotics.)

Anyway, the Tourist didn't just get his game system. He got a free room upgrade after informing the hotel that it would have to provide what it advertised. And, this, somehow, was offered after the Tourist was told upon check-in that there were no room upgrades available for guests with 'preferred status' such as himself. Guess the two-room suite upgrade just appeared out of magic.

4. When a nationful of panicked tourists are afraid of terroristic strikes at Disney World in Orlando, avoiding the place in droves, you should:

A. Anticipating the reach of a weapon of mass destruction, you should make immediate plans to move out of the country. Even if you live as far away as Toledo.
B. Avoid even WEARING a Mickey Mouse T-shirt ... You never know whom those terrorists will target!
C. Head to Orlando in a New York minute and take advantage of ridiculously short lines

The answer is C, again. Spending four days in Orlando in February, we whisked in and out of all kinds of attractions without lines. Or, in the case of a crowd-pleaser like the safari at Animal Kingdom, waited merely 15 minutes when 90 minutes or longer is usually the case. Fear, schmear.

5. True or False: The beach is the last place you'd want to be in the winter.

Chalk this one as another 'F.' The beach is clean and void of obnoxious, summer revelers. No cigarette butts were found on this visit to the Delaware beaches. Instead, the washed over sands reflected the sunset's hues like a long, elegant mirror. And, oh, what part about vastly reduced hotel rates is difficult to stomach? Not to mention the 180-degree turnaround in the attitudes of retail and restaurant service employees, given that people are actually GLAD to see a tourist for a change? Returning to Rehoboth for a long weekend in winter, we managed to save hundreds of dollars on hotel charges and outlet sales alone.

And, last, for extra credit:

The hands-down funniest thing the Tourist saw on his many excursions this year was ...

.. you guessed it (not!). A dog with all four of his legs wrapped in duct tape on a dirt road while the Tourist took his little family to Berkeley Springs, W.Va. Enjoying the mountain air and hot springs, it was nice to see a place that (at least for now) still preserves its quirky charm. In this case, why pay for a veterinary clinic visit and splints? There's nothing duct tape can't do, right? Now, the Tourist realizes that he should have tut-tuted over such a scene with grave, PC-correct concern, and report the dog's owner immediately to the SPCA. But he couldn't. Since then, the Tourist hasn't failed to get a big laugh out of his beloved, 4-year-old lad with just the mere utterance of these three words:

'Duct Tape Dog.'

The Occidental Tourist is a magazine writer in Washington, DC. His column appears occasionally on Ticked.com. E-mail him at tourist@ticked.com.