It's safe to say the pre-holiday "no longer like standing on the surface of the sun" event and party season has officially started, which means productivity for this Monday morning is likely already off the table. Finish your coffee while we recap, those numbers can wait.
FRIDAY, OCT. 20:
Tampa and St. Pete announced they've joined forces in the race to become the home of Amazon's $5 billion secondary corporate headquarters, and shared the video created just in time to make the bidding period's October 19 deadline. Not mentioned in the video: the highly synergistic and insanely successful joint effort between the two communities to figure out how to share a baseball team.
The St. Petersburg Pier Art Committee narrowed the field of artists under consideration for Pier District commissions from more than 250 entrants to six finalists. The committee expects to begin seeing renderings from the artists around the beginning of the new year, so please try to hold your complaints about how the work does not jibe exactly with what you as an individual like until then, OK?
SATURDAY, OCT. 21:
Weeki Wachee celebrated 70 years of mermaid shows with an extravaganza that included an appearance by an 87-year-old original mermaid and performance by the "Legendary Sirens," a group of veteran mermaids now in their 60s and 70s whose original show predated synthetic tails and air hoses. You are not old school; they are old school.
Did you grab a venison steak sandwich from Arby's? There was a lot of advance hype about the menu item coming to Tampa Bay on Saturday, but when it finally got here, the reception seemed a little... lean.
A woman in Pasco allegedly tried to run over a deputy during an attempted traffic stop while throwing pills out the window and swallowing what she couldn't get rid of. She is probably not an ideal candidate for any potential Amazon Young Executive Mentoring Program that may be based locally in the future.
SUNDAY, OCT. 22:
And finally, as Tampa police continue to investigate a potential lone-wolf spree killer in Seminole Heights, HART rerouted a bus line that normally stops in the area where three murders took place, and hundreds of neighborhood residents participated in a candlelit vigil and march last night in a gesture of support and defiance. Watch out for one another out there, people.
