A box of Brick House!!!!!!!!

Takeout from Chilis can taste absolutely wonderful after waiting for more than an hour for a taxi. That is the latest thing I have learned.

I started the day by learning something very different, about the workings and history of the J.C. Newman factory in Tampa.

Kevin and I arrived at the Newman factory promptly at 10am. Eric Newman was on a conference call, so Human Resources person Amy took us around on a tour of the factory. We saw the women using various machines to make the cigars. In fact, at the main machine, a very nice Cuban woman kept pausing and then operating her machine so that Amy could explain every part of how the tobacco in packed into the binder and then covered with the wrapper, all done by a machine! Very cool!

And we saw the room where the huge piles of short filler tobacco are kept, and the freezer where the cigars are sent to make sure there are no bugs.

Then we were left in the lobby, while Amy went to see if Eric was free to say hello. Well, he was free, and that was the longest hello ever. He spent more than an hour giving us the whole story of his family and their cigar company, showing us into more spots that Amy had not, and then, at the end, presenting us with AN ENTIRE BOX OF BRICK HOUSE CIGARS!!!!!!!!

I was in shock for several hours after that. I don't know what happened, other than that some small children with very little knives stole all my money, all my clothes, and left me in a dirty gutter with a grubby paper towel in my mouth.

Then, in David Copperfield fashion, I walked many many miles, and a relative who didn't know I existed handed over all her money and gave me a new name. Pernicious. Yes, I know that's a horrible name.

Lunch at Tampa Bay Brewing Company followed, at which we also smoked some machine made cigars we were also given, which were not bad for machine made cigars.

It was raining during all this, raining and raining and raining. But we kept going, and we got wet, and we didn't like it. Eventually we broke down and bought umbrellas.

We took the bus in both directions to Ybor City, which we also learned how to do, which was amazing.

Upon returning to our hotel, we got ready for our evening meeting up with a local SC guy at the Tampa Humidor.

Wow, the biggest humidor I've ever seen! Tampa Humidor is big, and really cool. The owner Mike is really nice. But what else is new? All these cigar people are sickeningly nice. I'm growing to hate that in them. Tom Ufer appeared and we had a great time hanging out with him for a bit.

The only drag was when we called for a taxi and one never came. Then I called this luxury towncar place and the guy was gonna charge me $20 and I said sure, then the original taxi finally came, and I had to call the luxury guy and cancel and he wasn't happy, the poor slug.

A great day. Another great day! I mean, Eric Newman gave us a box of Brick House! Their new brand which is a revival of a very old brand. You see, the brick house was the house in Hungary where Eric's great-grandmother used to take in boarders to make ends meet. It's the place where the whole thing started! And here this new brand, which is not readily available in NYC yet, and Eric gave us a whole box. I mean, he left us near the end and said "wait right here, I'm gonna get you a couple cigars" and then he hands us an entire box, and we're thinking, "um, are all these for us?"

And they were! Eric Newman gave us a box of Brick House. And we are going to disperse them as we choose, bwwwaaaaahhhhaaaaahhhhaaaaahh!

OK, I'm getting tired. I'm going to start a new tradition. I'll call it sleep, and do it every night. And if anyone tries to stop me from doing it, I will pelt them with melting ice cubes.