“Why you at the bar if you ain’t poppin’ the bottles? What good is all the fame if you ain’t fuckin’ the models?”

- Nelly

As it turns out, it wouldn’t have mattered if I were driving a Tonka truck, because as it turns out, cars are just about the most useless things you can have in Miami. In fact, they go beyond useless, into the realm of being pathologically burdensome. I’m here to report that Miami Beach has the worst vehicle-related infrastructure of any city I’ve ever been to. Think Sunset Strip at 10:30 on a Friday night, increase the car-to-space ratio by  factor of 50 and add one idiot swerving in front of you every block,  one asshole double-parking every 50 feet and one complete and utter bag o’ douche STOPPING TRAFFIC TO GET OUT OF HIS CAR, WALK ACROSS THE STREET AND BACK every quarter mile. Oh, and all the spots are metered–no chance of a freebie anywhere.

But eventually, I found a parking space in front of Nikki Beach, which is this rather hedonistic place (aren’t they all here) where you pay lots to lounge on these large outdoor-friendly mattresses drinking delicious mojitos.  So I did the unthinkable. I bought a stupid bottle of alcohol. Bottle service. Ugh. Just saying the term makes me feel like I’m overcompensating. Yes, the mojitos are delicious. Yes, there was 2/3 of the bottle left over that I can come back and enjoy later, presumably with no further charges. But I had a dream of owning a small pony, and I was damn near all the way saved up for it. And now, that dream is dead, the pain numbed only slightly by minty refreshment.

Can someone tell me why the fuck we're embargoing these guys?

On to the third discovery of the day: After wrangling with the Miami parking system again in the afternoon (the parking permit dispensers consume dollar bills more voraciously than those recovering addict single mothers of 4 at Deja Vu), I found what’s purported to be the best Cuban sandwich around. For those of you unaware, the Cuban sandwich consists of ham, roast pork loin, swiss cheese, pickles and sometimes mustard grilled and pressed between special bread. It also has a sweeter, smaller cousin called medianoche, which has the same ingredients, but on a sugary bread. Dare I say it, the Cuban sandwich has passed the meatball sub in the pecking order of sandwich supremacy. What’s not to love? Four, maybe five ingredients, left alone, no fucking mayonnaise to bollocks it all up–El Sandwich Cubano (seriously, that’s the translation) almost single-handedly resurrected my shitty expensive day. In the 48 seconds it took me to devour it, I felt good about my decision to come here. Now, if I can just get some coke dealers to steal my rental car for me so I don’t have to deal with it anymore…