At the end of a long travel day all I wanted was a clean bed and a hot shower. But the clerk (I think he was the owner) refused to accept my card for the pet fee. Between his broken English and my exhaustion, it toom 10 minutes to figure out that he was telling me he didn't want to pay the Visa fees amd that he didn't care that Choice Hotels claims they accept all major credit cards. When I told him I don't travel with cash he told me to go to an ATM. I had to leave and search a strange town for an ATM because of this cheapskate. Then, the room was nauseating. Cigarette burns in the bedding (in a nonsmoking room), a strange brown smear on the "fresh" sheets, stained towels with holes, screens ripped and held in the frames with tape, a broken lock on the door, dust all around the baseboards because they've never done a deep clean, hairs on the counters, black mold in the bathtub. There no ventilation in the bathroom except for a window, which when opened exposes you to the pet area. That window did not lock. I didn't expect much, but the terrible service, the fact that I didn't feel safe, the filth factor that drove me to sleep on an air mattress rather than that sketchy bed, and that I didn't want to take a shower because of a black mold allergy, this was the single worst hotel experience of my life.