Process an http call against the hipchat api

def _api_call(self, path, data={}, http_method=requests.get):
        ''' Process an http call against the hipchat api '''
        log.info('performing api request', path=path)
        response = http_method('/'.join([self.api_url, path]),
                               params={'auth_token': self.api_key},
                               data=data)
        log.debug('{} remaining calls'.format(
            response.headers['x-ratelimit-remaining']))
        return response.json()