so tonight we had a guest who was upset that we ran out of parking temporarily. We had a giant gala in our hotel tonight as well as a traveling sports team and a wedding. We told people after 10pm parking spots would start to free up again once the gala ended. Offered people some solutions to solve this problem and told them places that were less than a minute away where they could park until spaces became free again in the garage and parking lot. We even waved everyone's parking fees for the inconvenience. I forgot to add that the places that were one minute away to park at were all 3-6 minutes away walking distance.

I had a very stubborn guest who had asked me what he was supposed to do sine there was currently no parking. I told him some places where he could park. He asked me if he could park in front of the hotel door where our fire lane is. I told him no because it's a fire lane. He told me he was going to leave his car there anyways because it was not his problem that we had no parking. I told him ok well don't be surprised when it gets towed. He told me "thanks for the threat". I said it's not a threat it's a promise because it's the counties rules and not ours. I explained to him why he could not park there legally. He finally caved in and went outside to move it.

20 minutes later guess what happened. Fire alarm went off and everyone had to evacuate the hotel. Someone had burned a bag of popcorn in the microwave to a crisp. That is not even all of it folks. People actually were not leaving the hotel and staying inside. I had people tell me it was cold outside and they did not want to have to leave and evacuate. They asked me if it was just a drill. I told them no and that unless they want to maybe get REALLY hot they needed to leave. Keep in mind the whole lobby was smokey and you could smell the burning and the alarm even stated that it was not just a drill. I also made sure everyone was not blocking the fire exit. Surprisingly people were leaving the building and just standing in front of the front door and not moving and clogging up the area so others could not get out. I directed everyone to safety and so did my other coworkers. Some people still decided to stand in front of the exits and clog them.

Have people all lost their minds?