MGM Mirage Hell Jeopardizing AAA rating?

I'm up in Boise for some assignments and not able to blog much today, but before I headed out into potatoland, I wanted to offer some quick updates from my email.

Solid sources have told me that last Sunday, as the crash was at its peak, the inspector from AAA came in to check in at 6 p.m. and walked out, returning at 10 p.m. It's hard to gauge the accuracy of this particular claim, but I've heard it twice now from separate sources. The property takes pride in its five-diamond AAA rating; not sure if such a problem would actually impact such a thing.

Meanwhile, MGM Mirage is like Compville these days. Front-deskers are giving out smaller comps to the quieter whiners ($50 value), bigger ones to the squeakiest wheels ($1,000+). I'm also told that folks who complain via letter will get more back, so do that if you've been staying there the past week and feel you're due.

Also, if you missed this, here's a testimony in the blog comments from someone who says he/she is a phone reservationist:

"I work room reservations for one of the MGM Mirage properties and it has been a nightmare for the last 5 days. Most people don't understand what "our system is down" means. They keep asking us the same questions over and over. The question of the week has to be "are you up yet?" and unfortunately the answer of the week is "No". Our hands hurt from manually writing all the reservations and then hoping we'll be able to get them into the computer sometime during the day or early evening. It has been insane and to we're exhausted is an understatement."

Finally, this reader is also a blogger and an affected Bellagio client. Read his account here.

So far as I hear, the nightmare's not over even now, a week after it started.