Part I: I Keeps It Gasparilla, Son

Howdy, folks. As you can see, I made it through Gasparilla despite one crucial tactical mistake - which I will get to in a second - and an erroneous error in the last post.

Turns out the thing they call the Night Parade - which I call freaky deaky sex land - does not immediately follow the day parade on Saturday. No, that simply would be suicidal. Tampa would become Snake Plissken's New York. In fact, it takes place a week later, i.e., this upcoming Saturday. I'd like to go, but my wallet will be the ultimate arbiter of that decision.

On to Gasparilla.


I knew I was in for one hellacious day. I'd be on foot most - if not all - of the time, I was going to be drinking heavily and I'd be navigating unfamiliar neighborhoods filled with drunken chaos. The semi-intelligent man would make sure he was fit for such an adventure, that fatigue would not become a factor.

However, I am not semi-intelligent, and I went to the club at 6 p.m. Friday where I stayed until approximately 2 a.m. drinking steadily.

"Hey," you say. "That's not too bad. You could still get home and catch a few hours of shuteye before making your way down to Gasparilla at 10 a.m." And you would be right, except that by that point, not only was I still not semi-intelligent, I was also tipsy. Stir in a little bit of what I like to call "a Puerto Rican girl with spectacular rackage," and you end up drinking at the casino until sunup.

At that point, I realize I have set myself up for a day of drinking with a difficulty factor of infinity, but there wasn't much I could do about it. I dropped off the female and made my way home, cursing my own stupidity as well as the bill I racked up at the Hard Rock. A shower and change of clothes later, I'm slightly soberer and on my way down to Hyde Park, the neighborhood that abuts Bayshore Boulevard which is the street the parade is on.

Driving down there was interesting, as it's one of those places where half the streets are one way, and on this day, the other half were blocked off by popo. I finally get within two blocks of my destination, the apartment of a friend who was hosting pregame activities, and pay $20 to park in a garage that is normally free. Free enterprise sucks ass.

Handle of Bacardi in hand, I stroll down to Lala's place. The streets and front yards are already filling with people doing their best to push the adult beverage industry to a record quarter. Across the street, some guys had a couple of flat screen plasmas on the lawn ... facing the street, for some odd reason. Next door to them people had already broken out a shot luge, and in front of Lala's two-story building, about 15 people had gathered to pound beer and play the bongos.

Lala and her friend had some breakfast food out - hash browns, strudel, cinnamon rolls, quiche (that was for the girls) - which may have saved my life. Mojito in one hand, potato deliciousness in the other, I scope out her building. The beer pong tourney was out back, and they were already moshing in a downstairs apartment. It's only 11 a.m.; the frigging pirates don't even invade for another half hour.

We load up our bloodstreams with fermented goodness until about 1, then head toward Bayshore, three blocks down. Some guy strolled by with a permanent marker "tattoo" on his bicep that read "I love dirty pirate hookers"; this was to become a theme for the rest of the day.

Quick geography lesson: Bayshore Boulevard is a four-lane road with a median that runs along the bay from downtown southwest for a few miles. Specifically, you have water, a grassy strip with a sidewalk, Bayshore and then the mansions that face the bay. It's absolutely gorgeous. And the city of Tampa was going to run a 120-float parade down it while 400,000 people walked around in various stages of intoxication destroying anything they could get their hands on. Makes sense to me.

The parade came up from the south in the northbound lanes; there were bleachers set up on the east (water) side that you had to have a hookup or a ticket to get into. Thus, the large majority of the spectators are in the southbound lanes facing east, backs to the mansions.

How to describe the scene, how to describe the scene ... OK, best I can do. Remember "Animal House"? Remember the Delts' parties? Where bottles were being thrown about indiscriminately, motorcycles were driven up stairs, married women were seduced, underage women pounded beers and bands cranked out them good notes? Picture that, but less orderly and with more eyepatches.

Keep that image in your mind, because I'm going to take a break here since this post is already hella long and I want to make sure I have whatever pics I can get my hands on to help illustrate the adventure.

If nothing else, come back in a day or two to see the "Cooler Scooter." Yes, it's like that.