We All Have a Yappy Dog, Make the Very Best Of It
My husband Ben and I hit the road to White Salmon, WA for a quick weekend getaway just a little over 60 miles outside of Portland, OR. We love this part of the country and we take any chance we get to make it over to the Hood River/White Salmon area to drink delicious NW beers at Double Mountain Brewery or hike around Mt. Hood with our pup.
We tried a new hotel called Inn of the White Salmon that we selected from Yelp reviews. As much as I love dogs, I don’t love yappy barking dogs outside my hotel room. There was a house next to the hotel with dogs that just ran around crazy all day barking at the wind. I asked the hotel if they had a different room on the other side of the hotel, but they were totally booked. Boo! I was bummed, but there wasn’t much we could do about it.
Ben and I headed out from breakfast and spent most of the day shifting through antique shops. When we returned to our room just before dinner, the hotel owner had left us a gift certificate in our room for two glasses of wine down the street, along with a short note apologizing for the noise. We were so surprised and very excited to enjoy the wine! It was clear the owner couldn’t do anything about the barking dog, but he was very empathetic. It meant the world to us at the time. The dogs still barked like crazy the next morning, but our tolerance had shifted. It doesn’t take much to make a huge impact on someone’s experience with your company even if you don’t have complete control over the situation at hand. You just have to be open to identifying the opportunities when they arise.
