So I just made reservations for a business trip to Florida next month. I've got to go down for spring training and cover some of the minor league camp for the Phillies, and those dates work out well with their exhibition game schedule.

But it's also tight because of how the Big East men's basketball championship game falls (8 p.m. on the 10th, but I made sure I'll have enough time to be seated at a bar or something by tipoff) and the opening of the NCAA Tournament (about noon on the 15th, and I'm expecting to touch down in Newark in time to catch the day's games).

Despite all that, and how I might not really have time to enjoy myself, I'm excited for my first business trip. Traveling on the company's dime is why I got into sports writing, after all.

But I was thinking today about the traveling -- the hotels, in particular. Well, motels. Having spent some time -- nights, weekends -- in them in various little towns and cities across America, and in recent years usually with a girlfriend of some sort, they've, well, kind of become a turn-on for me. It sounds weird, maybe a little lame, and perhaps seedy (it's definitely not that), but considering that many of my hotel stays in the last five years have involved -- some even been specifically for -- romance in several forms, it's kind of etched into my memory that way. There's just something about the large beds, the thin towels, the individually wrapped plastic cups and hideous tap water after 12 beers that brings back memories.

Good thing I don't travel with my family much anymore; well, at least I don't stay in the same hotel room with them anymore.

In fact, the Hotel Desk Hostess has even creeped into my fantasies, right up there with the cheerleaders. There was one hostess in particular, in a Motel 6 or something in Youngstown, Ohio, several years ago who was very pretty. Only when I got to my room, I discovered that my toilet was backed up, so I called the front desk to inform them to send a maintenance worker with a plunger.

Who knocks on my door but the beautiful Hotel Desk Hostess. I can only imagine what she thought -- I could tell by the way she acted that she didn't buy the story that I found it this way.

That experience (minus the toilet) and others have melded into something out of a cheesy R-rated love scene ...

� EXT. CLEARWATER BEACH, FLORIDA. SPRING BREAK - DAY

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�INT. ECONOLODGE, CLEARWATER BEACH - DAY

The motel lobby. A young woman (played by Claire Forlani) stands at the front desk, organizing paperwork. A young sports writer, about the same age, enters and walks up to the desk.

DANOHi there. I have a reservation.

The hotel clerk, JENNIFER, 28, is tall, slender, with brown hair down to the top of her shoulders. She looks up to see DANO, 24, fit, well-groomed and casually dressed. She smiles.

JENNIFERWell, sir, let's get you checked in.

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The check-in process complete, JENNIFER hands DANO a keycard.

JENNIFERThere you go: Room 69. I get off at 4:30.

DANOYeah? Better make that 4:45. And again at 4:55, and just after 5 p.m. ...

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�INT. ROOM 69 ...