Finally got to fly away, but by then it was too late to get a connecting flight out of Dallas. So AA offered us all vouchers for Motel 6. As if. Because my rad friend Mark used to live in Dallas, and we once met for lunch on a brief layover, I knew the secret of DFW. The Grand Hyatt is actually attached to the airport! No shuttle bus, no nothing. Just take the high-speed train to the right gate and voila! A night of pampered luxury, for only $140. Because they wouldn’t give me cash or any sort of substitute for the Motel 6 voucher, I just gave it back to them and said “Merry Christmas!”

The DFW Grand Hyatt is the pinnacle of service and design, I finally felt like I was getting my money’s worth, in a time when most hotels charge entirely too much for the crap service and hideous, outdated, dirty rooms they offer. Some might call it pricey for an airport hotel, but I doubt they paid as little for that gate-side spot as Motel 6 and its cohorts did for their god-knows-where spots. And they spoiled me rotten, overfed me at breakfast (free! fresh OJ refills? who does that???) and had a 24 hour pool. Problem with the pool was that although it was heated, the air around it was 25, and well, I’d need the pool to be at least 100 to offset that.