Well, we did finally find it (by calling booking agent and credit card company I think). So now we made our way toward the hotel and the nice beach. 2.5 miles of white sand. And all the fat teenagers you could ever think of. Ugh. But this was at least balanced by the greater numbers of old people. And let's not forget all the pink. Everything was pink. Weird.
Anyway, we got settled and started looking for food. Plenty of places around so this wasn't a problem. Then off to the beach to relax. Just lying on the beach for a few hours was so nice compared to having to do school shit, I can tell you that. Then back to the hotel to change and out to dinner.
Now after dinner and back at the hotel was the extra bonus. Yep, I'm talking about basketball (what were you thinking?!) It was college basketball championship week and the room had ESPN and ESPN2, so I was all set. I didn't even care what game I was watching, it was college hoops and it wasn't homework. There was also other TV. Like an HBO special on sexy commercials or something. Those foreigners get away with more skin on TV, big deal.
The funny one was a Renault commercial for its new (when the commercial originally aired) SUV. They knew their vehicle was ugly so they made a commercial about it. In it the SUV is out in Africa someplace (which is where you might actually need one, not the suburbs). Along comes a Rhino, which mistakes the SUV for one of its own kind, and promptly f-cks it. Dammit, that was funny.
Thursday morning
This would go basically the same as Wednesday. That is, whatever we thought was
going to happen, wasn't. The idea was to rent some bikes and bike the renown
Pinellas Trail. We actually had maps to get to the local bike shops, so we were
off. As we get closer to the shops we see signs of the trail. But that can't be,
because this is in the middle of the city. We get to one shop and it's either
closed - which is weird since it's already 10:30 - or out of business. The
second shop (across the street), was out of business. We then double back for
the third shop, and we never find it because it was in a redneck trailer park
part of town and had no signs.
Along the way we saw plenty of bikers. Here they were, riding up and down city streets. All of which had a 4-way stop sign at every block. Damn. We finally get more info, and yep, almost the whole trail is nothing but fighting city traffic with no scenery whatsoever and we can't even find a bike shop that's open. Nice.
So we went with an alternative plan. Let's all got to the zoo! The Lowery Zoo is in North Tampa, so we knew it would be a bit of a drive. Back through the stupid double-laned roundabout, through more traffic, over the long bridge, and into Tampa. During this section of driving we saw scenic places to ride bikes, but no rental shops. Figures.
Finally we get to the zoo. It's March and it's already hot in Tampa. We're thinking we need to get inside quickly and get some food and bottled water. Quickly was never going to happen. The place was packed and there was already a line. I hate lines.
Tune in tomorrow to see if I actually had to kill anyone.