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It just happened again.

I was sitting here in my hotel room, minding my own business, when the alarm sounded all through the hotel along with the voice over stating to evacuate the building, avoiding the elevators.

Me and four other guests staying on this floor formed a posse. Our mission was to find our way out of the building. I know that sounds easy, but it sure wasn't. Thank heavens it must have been a false alarm, because by the time we found our way out it was 20 freakin' minutes later!

You'd think that a stairway marked "fire exit" would lead the way out. You could think that, but you'd be wrong. The five of us headed for the stair way that was closest to us. Keep in mind, we are on the fourth floor. We ended up going down one flight only.

On the third floor, we had to look around for another door. We finally found one that said "Fire Exit Only. Opening this door will sound alarm". Well, an alarm was going off anyway, but I am such an idiot, I actually stopped to think about if it was right for us to go through that door. Luckily, the four people with me were a little smarter. Out that door we went.

Down to the second floor.

Can you believe it? We still can't find out way out of the freakin' building from a fire exit. Finally we found a door that took us out to the parking garage. Know what? there is no walking exit out of the parking garage. There are two narrow ramps, one up and one down that I for one was not willing to walk on to get out. The ramps look wide enough for a car and that's it. Someone coming blindly up that ramp would take me out in a heart beat. The five of us took off in different directions to find a way out, only to meet up back in the middle at the elevators. I know you're not supposed to take the elevator but I figured we are technically in a different building, so I was going for it.

The five of us, one floor down, finally into the main level of the hotel.

By the time we found our way down there, everyone was quite casual just milling about. Obviously the emergency was over, whatever it was. We must have missed it while we were in the parking garage. Now there was a line at the elevators to get back up to our rooms.

I learned two things.

1. I am thankful that I had my four new found friends to help me find my way out of this building. I don't think I would have found it on my own.

2. Had this been an actual emergency, we'd have all been dead. The Adams Mark Hotel in down town Buffalo is one messed up place with a f-ed up emergency evacuation plan.

While we were waiting in line for an elevator back upstairs, we were discussing it amongst ourselves. And, we decided that had it not been for the fact that American Idol was starting, we'd have marched five strong over to the front desk to give them a piece of our minds.