If I could adjust my request and approach the “ask” from a different angle, something interesting and unexpected might happen—and it often did. For one rejection attempt, I tried to get a free room at a luxury hotel and was turned down flat. But after retreating to a lesser request, I wound up getting a tour of one of the hotel’s rooms and was allowed to take a nap on one of the hotel’s famously comfortable beds. During another rejection attempt, I walked into a local fire station and asked if I could slide down their fire pole. As it happened, the building had only one story, and there was no
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