Reflections
Mayer, Milton
REFLECTIONS Milton Mayer Staying with the Reagans We split a quarter-pounder and a milkshake at McDonald's, $1.96 for the two of us. On to Motel 6, $20.31, including seventy-five cents for...
...The fact that I know enough to stay at Motel 6 proves that I am more intelligent than Mr...
...It wasn't J.S...
...They were in Washington, D.C., where (according to The Los Angeles Times, free at the Century Plaza) Mr...
...Want to bet that he doesn't pay five or ten times that much, plus room service and rooms and room service for his Secret Service persons...
...In your room at the Century Plaza you have a refrigerator...
...Lots he cares about Poland...
...R. was announcing further welfare cuts and an increase in (you should forgive the expression) defense spending...
...R. a piece of my mind, which he could use and I wouldn't miss...
...That doesn't mean that you meet a higher class of people at Motel 6 than you do at the Century Plaza...
...It looks like every other Motel 6.) At Motel 6, the television set is hanging half off the wall...
...Nothing like that in the Motel 6 candy machine...
...you may order breakfast for tomorrow morning right now...
...No room service at Motel 6, and tomorrow morning no hard knock at the triple-locked door, not at Motel 6, and, when you open it instead of squinting out the view port, no three hard-looking blue-serge types (not at Motel 6), one of whom says, "Hotel Security Service...
...If he cared about Poland he'd stay at Motel 6 and send the difference between $145.10 and $20.31 to Poland...
...The Reagans were not in residence at the Century Plaza the night we were there...
...Motel 6 gives you a small plastic ice bucket so that you (1) won't take too much ice or (2) think it worth stealing...
...The Century Plaza calls itself "The World's Most Beautiful Hotel...
...If I were the Reagans' bellperson I'd give Mr...
...Inhale...
...Motel 6 can't say that...
...If I gave Mr...
...For our (or somebody's) $ 145.10, plus a measly $1.00 tip to the bellperson going up—we carried our own stuff going down and didn't tip the carhop, who is the sole support of three widowed granddaughters—we got a good many things we didn't get for $20.31 at Motel 6. We got everything the Reagans get, including the bellperson's chatter going up...
...Just Dial 5.") Ordering is more of a fun thing at the Century Plaza than at Motel 6. At Motel 6 there's a candy machine outside the office, and you order a nickel candy bar by putting thirty cents in the slot...
...Its guests have included "presidents, kings, astronauts, and celebrities from every corner of the world...
...We'll be climbing over your balcony to get into the next room...
...R. doesn't even know what Motel 6 looks like on the outside...
...The Century Plaza is where the Reagans stay in Los Angeles...
...The sink and over-the-sink shelf in the bathroom are made of un-marbled plastic instead of marble and are studded with cigarette burns...
...Baby and I felt so excruciatingly bad about anybody's paying $145.10 for a night's flop, instead of $20.31, that we asked the desk clerk, who could see that we weren't the Reagans, if he didn't have something cheaper, or more affordable...
...Motel 6 gives you a small bath towel, a small hand towel (for small hands), and a minuscule washrag...
...You folks remember J.S...
...The room was $128, plus $9.60 tax, plus $7.50 for the garage...
...No gorgeous bed lamps—no bed lamps—at Motel 6 and nobody to turn down the bed at eventide and leave a little package on the bedside table with "Sweet Dreams" on the outside and a three-layer chocolate mint (the middle layer is green mint cream) inside and a little card next to it with the following in gothic print: Good night—rest well...
...The Century Plaza smothers you in humongous orange towels, orange being the school colors of the Century Plaza...
...I would tell him he was a ridiculous old man playing cowperson with nuclear six-shooters and he ought to be ashamed paying $145.10 a day at the Century Plaza and cutting the crusts of the poor...
...And gorgeous bed lamps...
...Mill who said, "The man who says, 'Rich men are fools, but when I am rich I will not be a fool,' is already a fool...
...No Vaults at Motel 6. You lump your Valuable Papers, Furs, Jewelry, and Cash under the mattress and go to sleep...
...R. And he, while he is better looking than I am, in a grade-B way, smiles garishly, and then scowls just as garishly to show that he is being serious and that Poland is no laughing matter...
...We are such stuff As dreams are made on, and our little life is rounded with a sleep...
...A year ago the Century Plaza advertised suites at $750—that's to rent, not to buy—so I suppose that would be $1,000 now and maybe $1,500 or $2,000 for presidents, kings, and astronauts...
...ItwasJ.S...
...Shakespeare (Memento mod, with the following appended, in case your little life is not rounded before morning: "A suggestion...
...No room telephone at Motel 6. Three room telephones (one in the bathroom) at the Century Plaza...
...I was reading him in bed—by flashlight—at Motel 6 and by lamplight at the Century Plaza...
...It was Confucius...
...What's good enough for the Reagans is at least good enough for the Mayers...
...R., but if she were more intelligent she wouldn't be washing her own hair and cutting her husband's and staying at Motel 6. A dollar takes ten that Mrs...
...The company had ordered a moderate-rate room for us, and this was it...
...The shower is a one-piece plastic, and just barely big enough to get into...
...No balcony for the Security Service to climb over at Motel 6. No Security Service...
...R. a piece of my mind, without inhaling, he would smile and say, "Thank you," and one of his Secret Service persons would get me canned for having dared to, and Ms...
...I'm not even sure that the "guests" are richer at one of the two "hostelries" than they are at the other...
...Baby Mayer would get her crusts cut...
...The Reagans stay at the Century Plaza at (I hope) their own expense, the Mayers at somebody else's...
...On to Motel 6, $20.31, including seventy-five cents for television...
...And on, the next day, to the Century Plaza in Los Angeles, where the room, overlooking the plaza, was framed by the twin Century Towers with the hills between them in the background...
...There's only one lock on the door, on the assumption that robbers aren't interested in the people who stay at Motel 6. Robbers are interested in the Century Plaza, where there are two locks (one of them "excluding all keys") plus a chain plus a peephole ("view port") plus a Suggestion from the Management that you open the door on the chain "for your convenience...
...Mill, the Englishman...
...Mill who said, "I would rather be Socrates than a pig, and if the pig disagrees with me, I have the better of him in the argument, for he has only been a pig, while I have been both Socrates and apig...
...Baby is better looking than Mrs...
...The Century Plaza provides Special Fireproof Safety Deposit Vaults for your Valuable Papers, Jewelry, Furs, and Cash and warns you against keeping them in your $145.10 room...
...Even so, Ms...
...At the Century Plaza you dial 5 and order, as an appetizer, "Ma-losol Caviar with Blinis" for $50.00, followed by Candlelight Dinner for Two ($65.00), topped off by a bottle of Moet & Chandon or Dom Perignon champagne at $105.00 additional...
...He said he didn't, "at the moment...
Vol. 46 • March 1982 • No. 3
