The Tampa Tea 🍵(January 19)

Welcome to The Tampa Tea!

In today’s edition:

• One week until Gasparilla - the countdown is on!

• TikTok is BACK BABYYYYYY

• Event of the week in Tampa

• Restaurant spotlight

• And more…

Last week’s newsletter

If you’re new here, check out last week’s Gasparilla Newsletter:

Tampa Tea Gasparilla Edition

I went over everything you need to know for Gasparilla…

Bar crawls, brunches, when to show up to the parade, where the parade route is, when to be ready by, etc…

And I’m too lazy to type it all out again, so hit that link above and give it a read!

Now let’s dive into this week’s edition:

ONE WEEK TILL GASPY

Kids’ Gasparilla was yesterday…

And I think it’s hilarious that Gasparilla is so insane that they had to create a kid’s version a week prior to keep the children safe from the madness.

“Alright Billy you had your fun yesterday… This Saturday you’ll be with the babysitter all day, alright?”

Never heard of a parade that isn’t kid-friendly.

Welcome to Tampa!

Coming up on my 4th Gaspy this year, here are a few tips:

• Get ready to start drinking around 9 AM. Personally, the 830 AM shower beer on Gaspy is one of the most enjoyable beers of the entire year.

• Have a ticket of SOME kind. Brunch, bar crawl, or parade lot… Something. Adventuring around the city is fun, but it’s a mad house… I have the most fun when I bounce from bottomless brunch to the parade route.

• Get invites to a few house parties as well - this is the one day out of the year where you can go to a Project X type house party with no fear of getting busted.

• PACE YOURSELF… The amount of people who don’t make it past 1 PM and wind up passed out on someone’s lawn is a funny sight to see every year

• If you are gonna go hard, leave it all out there during the day. Gasparilla night is a mess and honestly not worth saving yourself for.

• There’s little to no cell service all day… Keep your group with you, and expect to walk 30,000+ steps. Wear

• comfy shoes!

What to Expect on Gasparilla

If this is your first Gaspy, here’s what to expect:

• There will be little to no cell service all day because of how many people are in the city. Finding your friends, getting Ubers, etc will be very tricky unless you have wifi. Adds to the fun!

• Ubers are near impossible because no service and road closures, so plan to walk a SHIT TON - wear comfy shoes that won’t give you blisters (I’m talking to you ladies)

• It starts early - I’m talking 9 AM heavy boozing. Pace yourself and drink some damn water!

• Wear anything white or black or Bucs colored - pirate attire is cool but you aren’t gonna look out of place with a regular fit on! I’d plan to dress warm, and let the booze blanket carry you the rest of the way.

• It’s a complete free for all and shit show in the best way. If you wanna throw a crazy party or pregame, this is the day to do it! Noise complaints / Karen neighbors are out of the equation.

• Stack up on beads! Fellas you may just get a girl to kiss you in exchange for some beads. Just sayin

If you have ANY other questions about Gasparilla, what to do, where to go, what to expect… respond back to this email and I’m happy to help!

TikTok is BACK

This whole TikTok ban felt like a stunt. Ban goes into effect on Saturday night and is reinstated Sunday afternoon?

Felt planned the entire time.

Either way, the only way this newsletter thrives is with TikTok up and running…

The show goes on!

Speaking of TikTok…

Restaurant Spotlight

I was hearing a lot of hype about the Bacon Egg N’ Cheese food truck in Downtown Tampa, so I had to try it out:

@cbwritescopy

If this sandwich had an NYC bagel it would be 12/10

Listen, I’m from New York. I’ve had more NYC bagels than I can even count.

And I’ll be honest, the roll on this sandwich comes NOWHERE near an authentic New York City bagel.

BUT…

The bacon, the sausage, the egg, and the cheese inside the sandwich, all fire.

Super light on the stomach, didn’t feel like shit after I ate it.

I’ve had some FIRE breakfast sandwiches that make me feel awful afterwards, and I’ll question if it was even worth eating.

Not the case with this sandwich.

A solid 7/10 as far as breakfast sandwiches go, but it is worth trying out. Especially if you’re hungover on Sunday from Gasparilla.

Event of the Week

You know what…

With Gasparilla coming up, there isn’t a thing that could top it, so I won’t even try this week.

Go get a few hard workouts in. Sit in the sauna. Get your 8 hours. Do a cold plunge session.

See you Saturday.

Christian