...........but here goes; Picketing Baywalk right now would be pretty stupid for the following reasons -
1. The weather is attrocious, I mean it is like 90 degrees every day. Nobody wants to stand in the hot-ass sun and listen to a bunch of people they could'nt give a rat's ass about (unless the speaker had lots of cleavage and an ass like a nectarine) because they just want to get their candy ass into some AC as quickly as possible.
2. The main attraction there right now is just the movie theatres and a few trendy bars. The rest is just window dressing and get this folks, Sembler's company is having to subsidize some of the tenant's rents because business is so fuckin lousy there. I know this for a fact, because my downstairs neighbor works at Cristo's, an upscale clothing store for wealthy women. This project came about from the ashes of Bay Plaza Development which used to run the Pier (which by the way is also chock full of tacky ass shops that nobody in their right mind would visit more than once) and like the Pier, Baywalk runs on the old Melvin Business Philosophy "THERE'S A SUCKER BORN EVERY MINUTE" which allows him to operate such a cheezy ass complex. With a seemingly endless supply of tourists and dumbasses and a local population pushing 1 million, the money is in the bag so to speak. As far as I know, Baywalk is already paid for so it can afford to suffer.
3. Lastly, people cannot be "made" to care. It is not like in the program, when someone would stand up and relate about their heavies and we would be forced to show "empathy and sensitivity" and all that other crap. People want to see a show. They wanna see cops busting skulls in and bloodshed and buildings in flames and shit. The best thing we could do as protesters is do a live presentation of the Bingo play and hand out informative flyers, or maybe stage some live music, but sadly most of the alumni down here would suddenly realize that it might "harsh their buzz" to stand outside in 90 degree heat where they have to park 3 blocks away and move the car every hour and a half, or else park in the Sembler Garage for about $7.50 and for what?
In closing I will just say what I would like to do about all this shit. I think it is about time I gather all my stuff together into a small booklet and make it available to the public. I will try to keep the cost down and get it into circulation as cheaply as possible. We had a small regional best seller here called "Tampa Triangle Dead Zone." I was lucky enough to get to know the co-author of the book, and found out that it is not all that hard to get something published once you know the right people. I know that in the past couple of years I have touched the lives of many of you and I have a certain flair for writing, so if you don't hear from me as often as usual, it is because I am writing elsewhere. Make the most of what's left of this summer, take care............ Bob in St. Pete
