Sometimes it pays to be gay!

Before we left on our road trip, our friend Meg told us about Priceline.com. It’s not that we’d never heard of it before… the commercials are funny, but I tend to not take advice from William Shatner. However, Meg had nothing but good experiences with Priceline, so we decided to give it a try when booking our hotel room in Nashville. We were stoked when we got a 3 and a half star hotel for $50 for the night, just 8 miles outside the city center.

Driving up to the front gates (gates?!), we were exuberant. However, while I was unloading bags from the car, Kendra’s excitement was quickly waning. The woman helping her at the front desk pointed to a deep cluster of luggage in the lobby from the many, many other folks who’d arrived before us and were not yet able to check in, and indicated that there was very little chance our room was ready. Furthermore, she stated that all the king size beds were filled. Bummed, Kendra went to take out her credit card, but realized she had not brought it inside. She offhandedly said to the woman, “Oh, my wife has my credit card.”

In the South, we are more cautious about being out in the same way we are at home. More people want to “save” us down here. However, this particular woman seemed rather butch, so Kendra threw caution to the wind. Turns out, that was a wise move. I came in soon after, handed Kendra the credit card, and wandered off after Addie, who was crawling across the lobby. A few minutes later, Kendra walked over with a big smile and pass keys to a room. I was bewildered, as she had just given me the same rundown the woman behind the counter had given her regarding check-in. Not only had the woman bypassed us through the line of waiting customers, she had upgraded us with a king-sized suite! The last thing she asked Kendra was where we were from. When Kendra replied, “Massachusetts,” the woman said, “that makes sense.”

So in a world where being gay isn’t always a boon, sometimes, in a place you’d least expect, it works to your advantage. 🙂