Me and the boys, we’re just cruisin’ along down the road when we come up on this guy. From a distance I thought “73 Mustang!” We got up close and changed our tune. That looks like a ’72 Javelin SST, and if it were any sweeter it’d be made out of honey.

Marek wanted to take some pictures while we were driving. He took this nice shot of Ivo.

Marek wanted me to take a picture of “Cadbury” the bunny. Cadbury arrived on the scene during Easter and quickly, within 24 hours, won an award for “cherished childhood toy mom and dad are most sick of hearing about.”

For breakfast this morning we decided to go to this motorcycle shop. To get actual food, we’ll go next door to Emily’s at 7048 Park Blvd N in Pinellas Park, but the real nourishment will come from those rows of rockets on the left.

We found a seat along the wall where we had a window overlooking the bikes. Marek looked over the menu and decided, “pancakes.” For “Cadbury, dad.”

We made regular spot-checks on the motorcycle shop, just to make sure it was still there and that they hadn’t sold all the bikes yet. I’ve got a big $20 in my pocket, hoping that I can turn it into a new motorcycle!

We had a bit of four-stroke engine lubricant. This’ll keep our engine purring.

Bet you thought we got away without the eating machine. Here he is, hungry and ready for action!

Inside Emily’s you’ll find a very nice, clean, quiet atmosphere. The most distinguishing feature is the round lunch counter you see here. No one was sitting at it this morning. If it’s just Marek and I we’ll sit at the counters, but I’m already in danger of winning “Father of the Year” for my hijinks with Ivo; I’m not about to also balance him on a stool and take pictures of it.

I’m a new parent. There’s a lot of things I don’t know about kids. And here’s one of them. I’m minding my own business, looking at bikes through the window, getting Ivo’s breakfast ready, and I turn around to see Marek’s butt. I have no idea what’s going on here.

Here’s Ivo’s delicious snot meal. Mmmm, mmmm, good. Am I ever glad I’m not a baby, so I don’t have to eat this.

Something I’ve never seen at a breakfast restaurant (and believe me, I’ve seen almost every breakfast shack in the Bay Area) is baby food. It would not cost a lot of overhead for a restaurant to offer jars of Gerbers, baby oatmeal, stuff like that for babies who are just moving away from bottles but not quite advanced enough to cut their own pancakes. Probably wouldn’t sell a lot of it, but then again a jar doesn’t expire for years.

Ivo’s got to eat first, because otherwise he ends up in some other family’s booth, eating their purses and shoes. Note that “chicks dig him,” and I can assure you, they do. Though I’ve noticed that girls are slightly less attracted to two kids. One kid, when Marek was Ivo’s age, was a major aphrodisiac for ladies young and old. Two kids still attracts older ladies, but seems to count as “baggage” to the younger ones.

Here comes breakfast. Pancakes, bacon, and floppy eggs. Ivo sure wants some pancakes. Every weekend it’s like this, his gooey hand in my breakfast. Since Marek and I are splitting this one, I gave Marek the top pancake. He’ll never notice, until 20 years from now when he’s reading this. Hey Marek of the future, sorry about that, but when you have your own little Marek Juniors you’ll do the same thing.

Here’s another case of “I’m glad Mom doesn’t read these reviews.” Marek is very proud of his new ability to use a knife to knead a pancake to a pulpy mush that could then be eaten with a straw.

Marek, waving knife around: “I can DO it, dad!”

Me, ducking and handing over my wallet: “Yes you can, son, yes you can.”

No breakfast is complete without a does of HFCS.

We’ve learned our lesson well. In the Breakfast Battlefield, you always have a DMZ. Note the empty space on the table to the right: That space is exactly the length of Ivo’s left arm.

Marek and I agreed. The chow here at Emily’s is pretty good. Floppy eggs: nicely done. Bacon: a bit of crisp without being burnt. Pancakes: not shabby. Coffee: black and never ran dry.

I don’t need to tell you anything about this picture. It says it all by itself.

Ivo had some toast to go with his bowl of goo.

The bill wasn’t bad. Twelve clams for a breakfast that fed both of us.

Marek jumped up to pay.

While we were discussing the bill and the merits of the breakfast, Ivo had a top-off.

And proved that he’s intensely cute, but also, profoundly lazy.

Marek came back with change and also a pop! Now THAT is a good breakfast restaurant.

All Done!

We had some very nice chow, with reasonable bacon, floppy eggs, and nice pancakes, plus also some good black coffee that never went dry. Emily’s is a solid breakfast experience. We’re pleased to give Emily’s a Tampa Bay Breakfast four pancake rating.

I don’t think there’s any question on what we did next. We looked at motorcycles!

This was Marek’s favorite. He is also a Honda man, like his old man.

This was my favorite. Set up for drag, no kidding.

This is the same bike I used to run back before there were children. You can even find me on http://www.ironbutt.com/ with this bike.

In case you didn’t believe me.

And here’s what one of those looks like when you ride it through the back of a Volkswagen. Walked away from it, I did, but a lot of my money stayed at the bike shop that day.

We visited Shirley’s Soul Food at 1789 34Th St in St. Pete on 16 April 2011. Shirley’s is in a neat old rail car. The only other one we know in the Tampa Bay area is Nicko’s on North Florida. You can’t go wrong with breakfast in a rail car!

Shirley’s has a very basic menu. And the first thing they told us was that they were out of bacon. That’s not the best sign, I’ll admit.

Marek already knows what he wants! Pancakes!

Marek played shy-boy and wouldn’t say what he wanted. He had to have it coaxed and tickled out of him.

Ivo looked on. Thinking, no doubt, about time someone else gets tickled in this family. Notice the seat backs in the booths? Those are lovely. A hidden gem of Art Deco tucked away in a soul food diner.

We had a serious discussion about knives. And serrations. And cutting things. This is Marek, running his fingers along the knife edge, telling me he can use his own knife and he knows how and he won’t cut himself.

This is one clean, shiny floor! I don’t usually take pictures of floors (it’s odd enough that I take pictures of pancakes, wouldn’t you say?), but it was so shiny! And terrazzo, too.

We had to get Ivo started first, because his appetite waits for nothing. That’s Xavier looking on in the back. He would have a couple bites of his own breakfast and then come over to see what we were doing and then go back to get another couple bites. Ivo’s still in the car seat, balanced on a chair, because they didn’t have any highchairs. You can always tell when a place doesn’t really get a lot of family business.

Here comes breakfast. Marek’s mom is going to be sore that I let him use a knife, so I hope she doesn’t really read these reviews. She says she reads them, but she probably just skims through. Baby, if you’re reading this one, I wanted to make Marek stop, but … he had a KNIFE! I couldn’t get close to him, or he’d have stolen my wallet.

Ivo’s got to get his hand in.

Marek got some syrup help. I don’t think he needed help, but she was so sweet and, I think, sweet on Marek.

And so we all dug in! I had the corned beef hash since they were out of bacon. This hash was the best I’ve had in years. Dedicated readers will know that I’ve never actually ordered hash since we’ve been writing Tampa Bay Breakfasts, but still, this was delicious.

When we were done, Marek made a quick trick brick stack.

Marek agreed to pay the bill.

This is the rail-car side of Shirley’s. If it were just me and Marek we’d have sat at the counter, but Ivo isn’t ready for that kind of funnybusiness.

Marek told me he’s keeping the change for his parachute fund. Marek of the future, if you’re reading back through these and find the notes about your parachute fund, I’m going to have to admit to you a terrible family secret. Every time you kept the change and put it in your little pockets, you forgot about it, then we wash your clothes, find change in the washing machine, and throw it in the car-wash-and-parking-meter jar. So you’re not actually making any headway on the parachute fund.

Not a bad deal, two breakfasts for 11 bucks.

We did a little bit of goofin around.

And a little more goofin around.

Shirley’s has a bowl of candy!

It’s always a happy day when Marek has a pop!

We had a very nice breakfast this morning. Shirley’s was welcoming, the chow was delicious, the coffee hot and good. The price was right. Missing bacon and a high chair. We’re pleased to give Shirley’s a Tampa Bay Breakfasts four pancake rating.

We’re taking a really long ride this morning. Have to tank up. The Official Gas Station of Tampa Bay Breakfasts is the Citgo on Lois. Tell Jimmy that Andy sent ya!

We’re heading all the way to St. Pete Beach this morning. We’re that dedicated to exploring every breakfast in the Tampa Bay Area. That’s the Don CeSar in the distance.

This approach is lovely enough to show twice, for those homesick Florida ex-pats who can’t get enough. Here’s for you, New Hampshire.

Growing up, I never knew the concept of paying for parking. I’d just park my truck in the woods. But down here in Tampa Bay we seem to pay for parking a lot.

Along the way we found this beautiful Prickly Pear. A little tedious to eat, but they’re delish. Especially if you’re tromping through the scrub and just happen across one.

We’re on Pass-a-Grill this morning, in case you hadn’t noticed. We’re going to 200 Gulf Way, Pass a Grille, to try the Paradise Grill for some breakfast. They have a nice little web site at http://www.theparadisegrille.com/.

Ivo’s hungry. He grabbed the first menu and chose it. No, he didn’t choose something from the menu, he chose everything on the menu.

We’ve had some good breakfasts with nice views, but never quite like this one. We could huck hashed browns at stingrays from here. Or maybe zing pancakes at those guys out there with the metal detectors. The options are pretty much endless.

We left Ivo strapped to the car seat for a while. Me and Marek, we’re busy goofin’.

Really, really goofin’ hard! I think they almost called the bouncers on us. Not that they actually have bouncers, but I’m sure they were wishing they did.

Also, are you loving my Daliesque Simpsons shirt? My Simpsonsesque Dali shirt? Real deal on a street market in Figueres ten years ago. Seriously. Just re-found it last month. It is not, however, my most exotic t-shirt. I’ll wear that one in a future breakfast, when I get some better pectorals to put under it (it seems to have, ummm, shrunk over the years!).

We at Tampa Bay Breakfasts are no stranger to challenges. We test pancakes in all sorts of situations so you can go for breakfasts confident that some crazy guy dragged his poor kids there first and took pictures for you. Here at the Paradise Grill, there’s no highchairs, just picnic tables. A bit of a challenge for a young father by himself with wee-lads. Look how precarious Ivo looks … I’m sure glad his mother doesn’t read our web site, or I’d be in trouble!

Here’s how we handle challenges at Tampa Bay Breakfasts. If there’s no high chair, I am the high chair.

To make things even more complicated, here’s breakfast! In a tourist beach location that’s so dependent on being clean and pristine, I’m a bit surprised that they use plastic everything. But here we are.

Let’s dig in! By “us” I mean Ivo, with the hands again. Some of our readers are wondering if I just have a rubber prop hand that I slip into these pictures and then blame it on Ivo. I know who you are. For example, you could be my own father thinking that, since you gave me a rubber hand years ago. No, this is really Ivo all the time. And my rubber hand is stored away in the Christmas ornaments.

Havin’ breakfast on the water’s edge. This is Florida livin’.

Ivo never seemed to notice that he wasn’t actually in a chair. Boy has his eyes on the chow!

Marek loves these sunglasses. What color are your sunglasses, Marek? They’re rainbow, dad!

We had a wonderful time at the Paradise Grill. Until we paid the bill. $20 for breakfast is pretty steep, where ever you go, but we figured that we were paying at least a 50% premium for the view. The bacon was outstanding, the eggs pretty good, the pancakes were sort of small, but they had to be to fit on the paper plates. Home fries were a nice addition and were delish. The coffee went down pretty smooth, too. An interesting observation, the female staff were all very perky and helpful but the male staff seemed sort of sullen and distant. Not like total-freak-show-sociopath, just not super-helpful to a guy with his hands full of little kids.

We’ll give the chow at Paradise Cafe a 3.5 rating, and bump it up a notch for the location. We’re pleased to give the Paradise Cafe a Tampa Bay Breakfasts four and a half pancake rating. Don’t go when it’s raining.

After breakfast we walked next door to the little crafts market that is here every Saturday. Marek got to pet a bird.

We found a pretty necklace for Mom!

We got to pet a dog named Cheeto!

And we couldn’t waste a trip to the beach, now, could we?

This isn’t Ivo’s first time in the sand. Mom took the boys to the beach for A Whole Day last week!

We’re on the beach on Dad Time, which means we didn’t bring towels or toys or anything. So … don’t get wet, boy!

While Marek capered, me and Ivo hung back and enjoyed the morning sunshine.

On the way home, we saw this Charger for sale. You can’t tell here, but it looks like the exhaust pipes are painted red. This car looks awesome from a block away.

All this really happened.

We visited the Central Coffee Shoppe at 530 Central Ave in St. Pete on 26 February 2011. Today is TBB Fan Christine’s birthday. Happy birthday, Christine! To get there we had to get on the highway. Would you classify those as altostratus and altocumulus clouds?

Beautiful St. Pete morning. Even the Altocumulus floccus clouds look like they’re ready for pancakes.

Ivo said he’d take care of parking. Don’t be too impressed. The meter is free on the weekends. And after reading this, you’ll spend the rest of your day thinking, “öko? Lögisch!”

We’re right across the street from The Dome Grill. Marek has his suitcase, just in case he needs some cars or maybe a tape measure.

Remember how last year we were at The Dome, and Aleshea said to go across the street? Where here we are!

We walked by this snake place. It wasn’t open at 0800 on a Saturday. Bummer!

Lucky for us, this little diner next to the snake store was open. What do you think, should we pop in for maybe some pancakes?

You, our dear TBB reader, have seen us look wistfully at the stools and counters over the years. One day little Marek will be tall enough to sit there. Today is the day. Marek is big enough to sit at the counter. Not, mind you, big enough to get on or off the stool by himself, but certainly big enough to sit there.

The menu has superlatives like eggs and catfish. How can you go wrong?

While we didn’t sit with Marek (or, rather, he didn’t sit with us), we did grab the closest table we could. Marek may be a man of the world, but he’s still just a little boy.

As you can see, the Central is just a tiny little place. Do you see what’s not tiny? That’s right, baby Ivo is one big little baby. What you can’t see here is the sound of him grunting, trying to get at the food. Uhn, uhn, uhhh!

Here’s Marek having his very own breakfast by himself at the counter for the very first time. He’s not phased a bit, as if he does this every day.

Breakfast independence over there. And Ivo hasn’t taken his eye off the spoon.

Breakfast these days usually includes a bottle of formula. This is a fine breakfast, with some very respectable bacon and eggs. See the little Grabby-McGrab hand in the lower right corner, just waiting for a chance? See how there’s a DMZ perimeter?

Marek, by this point, had pretty much forgotten we were there. Ivo, by this point, is starting to look at what the folks behind us are having, hoping maybe they’ll drop something and instead of falling on the floor it will fall into his mouth.

Marek’s just one of the guys. He’ll make a fine grouchy old man who sits at the counter every morning and likes his eggs just so and always reads the newspaper. If they still have newspapers when he’s an old man.

The look on Marek’s face here is, “Daaaad, quit, I’m trying to feed the baby!”

The look on Ivo’s face is, “I’m not taking my eye off that bottle.”

Marek paid the bill. Which was more challenging than you might think in such a small place. They got pretty busy and he had to hunt someone down.

The Central is pretty near a perfect little diner. It’s 100% mom-n-pop, it’s small and cozy, the chow is good, reasonably priced, pretty fast, and the people on both sides of the counter are friendly and regular. Almost everyone who walked in was “Hi, Jim” and “Mornin’, Betty.” The folks quite gleefully attended to Marek being at the counter. Little old ladies stopped by my table to tell me what a good job I was doing (little did they know, I’m part of a world-renowned pancake SWAT team). At the end of the day (or the breakfast, in this case), we had really fine time at Central.

Nicole, thanks for inviting us!

We’re pleased to give the Central Coffee Shoppe a Tampa Bay Breakfasts four and a half pancake rating.

We were already in St. Pete, so on the way home we drove by the basin. Marek announced he needed a boat so he could go fishing and catch Nemo and Dorey and Marlin. Should I be disturbed that when my kid watches Finding Nemo he identifies with the diver who catches Nemo instead of the obvious choice of identifying with Nemo himeself?

We drove by the Vinoy. Pink hotels on sunny mornings in Florida. There’s nothing like it.

After driving around St. Pete to let our pancakes settle, we jumped across the Gandy and stopped at the Redneck Riviera. Marek ran off in the sand.

Ivo stayed sleeping in the car, a fact which will probably win me a Father of the Year award.

It’s just a Florida morning. Hey Vancouver, Stuttgart, Cambridge, New Hampsha, New York, and Michigan, it’s February. Time to go to the beach.

We studied different kinds of tracks in the sand. We found birds, dogs, and little boy tracks.

When we got home, Ivo and I went back out to vote in the mayoral election. This was Ivo’s first experience with the democratic process. I voted for the visionary underdog (who lost, natch). Ivo voted for lunch.

Just a normal day.

Tell me, do you think my car would go faster if I had a paint job like this?

We’re blasting down the highway this morning to meet a Tampa Bay Breakfasts fan who gets the award for coming from the farthest distance just to have breakfast. We don’t want to be late. I took this picture while we were still in the driveway.

Gloomy weather again today. Looks like it might snow. (Keep it warm, Vancouver, ’cause it ain’t gonna snow here!)

Marek picked out the music. That’s right, Terrorfakt. Terrorfakt sounds a bit like two wet cats in a burlap sack. If the cats were made out of angry robots and had chainsaws. And the burlap sack was actually made from broken hacksaw blades. Marek seems to like it. I know I do.

I used to work in that building sometimes. I was this close to having a little tenth-floor office with a view of the bay, back in aught-six. Swing and a miss, as the baseball kids say.

We visited Skyway Jacks on 6 February 2011. This was our 68th visit to Skyway Jacks. Really just our 6th or 8th, but we wish it were 68. We like this place that much. Last time we were here was 7 November 2009. We awarded them the most prestigious, and in fact only specific Breakfast Award a bay-area restaurant can get, the 2009 Tampa Bay Breakfast of the Year.

Our arrival.

We look like movie stars.

Marek looks like a movie star. Marek looks like Justin Bieber.

Marek looks like I work for him.

I look like an analogue of Billy Ray Cyrus living off of his kid’s fame. But at least I have a leather Fonzi jacket. Marek does not.

Marek had a bizarre conversation with Humpty Dumpty. I was slow on the camera trigger and didn’t get a good shot, but one has to wonder what Humpty ever did to Marek. Humpty appears to be about 800 pounds of solid concrete.

It started raining. I hid under the giant chicken. Marek found this to be an hilarious event.

This is Marek looking at me taking a picture of him out in the rain while I’m dry under the giant chicken.

Marek stopped for a pack of smokes. Boy needs his Lucky Strikes.

After that picture above, I know what you’re thinking.

Exactly what you’re thinking.

You’ve got a scowl on your face. A disapproving scowl.

You’re thinking, Andy, while your four year is old buying cigarettes, it sure would be nice if you introduced your special long-distance Tampa Bay Breakfasts Guest Reviewers.

Sorry about that. Here’s our friends Phil and Atticus, all the way from Virginia just to have breakfast with us. (Phil’s the big one. He’s wearing shorts to taunt his friends back home.)

And, of course, this is Marek. And his old man, who is part of a Marek-fueled accelerated aging experiment where each minute ages him by an hour. I’m actually only 22 years old.

Atticus had to take a call from his broker. Marek’s not the only one who takes calls at breakfast. And he’s not the only pre-schooler with a broker.

While Phil and Atticus are sorting out how many shares of oatmeal Atticus is going to buy, me and Marek are goofin on four-year-old humor. Lucky for me, I was four once and never really lost my touch at burping.

The menu hasn’t changed. Still has our old favorites, scrapple for dad, scrambled eggs and pig brains for Marek. Somehow, our orders always end up being pancakes, and that’s probably for the best.

Marek took a long time to ponder the menu. Plus, he’s been learning to say “hypotenuse” so he’s got plenty going on up in that little pumpkin of his.

Notice how the guy in black, two tables over, has the exact same pose as Marek?

Atticus is a natural at this professional breakfast thing. Sitting a table in a loud, busy room, interacting with perfect strangers. Never missed a beat. Phil, too. A natural. We deputized them both as official representatives of breakfast. We just need to get badges made. Phil, this is worth putting on your resume.

We’ve had a breakfast or two here and there over the last few years. We can tell you about times when simple pancakes take 30 minutes in restaurants where there’s no other customers but us. And we can tell you about a slammed, line out the door place like Skyway Jacks where a whole lotta love, breakfast style, shows up in about 12 minutes. Barely time to roll cars back and forth with Atticus.

The first step: YOINK!

Then comes the high-fructose corn syrup, which will not win me “dad of the year” from the World Health Organization.

(Are you now wondering if WHO has a “dad of the year” award? Did you just google for it? Were you disappointed to find that they do not?)

Atticus had the oatmeal. It appeared to be deee-lish!

Marek says to Phil, out of the blue, “opossums are nocturnal.” I got it right here on camera.

Atticus got a bit of oatmeal approximately all over himself. Our very nice waitress gave him a scrubbing-down.

Can’t stay hyper without your smokes, your HFCS sugar, and your caffeine. I know how to raise a boy right.

The dedicated TBB reader is wondering, where’s the cars? Well, for some reason, they’re hidden behind the syrup.

The bill came. Twennyfive bigguns for breakfast for four. That’s not bad at all, especially considering that these are the best blueberry pancakes in the entire Tampa Bay sprawl.

Marek jumped into action. He is the Superhero of Breakfast!

If you look very closely, you’ll see Marek’s head over by the register. We saw that there was an extended conversation between Marek and the guy on the stool. No idea what they talked about, and that’s something I’ll never get to know.

I got almost all the change back. Marek held on to two quarters. He’s saving for a parachute. Seriously. He doesn’t know to take the quarters OUT of his pockets and put them in a jar or something, so I just get them back when we do laundry, but he’s pretty consistent in his new deal of taxing the change and saving it for a parachute.

And that’s how we wrap up one of the best breakfasts in Tampa Bay. Stay classy, Skyway Jacks!

As usual, Skyway Jacks delivers on all the things we love. Excellent pancakes, bacon, eggs, coffee, everything. Served quickly and for not much money. It’s loud, bustly, crowded, and full of crazy pigs and giant chickens and a 70’s cigarette machine. And it had our friends Phil and Atticus. There are places that try to be something like Skyway Jacks, and Skyway Jacks has its detractors who have good points to make, but I’ll say that what makes it work here is that Skyway Jacks ain’t tryin’ to be kooky-crazy, it just is what it is — and you, the visitor, are left to form your own opinions.

We’re pleased to re-confirm Skyway Jacks’ status as a Tampa Bay Breakfasts five pancake winner, and our first five pancake breakfast of 2011.

After breakfast, Marek and I offered to show Phil and Atticus around. “Put your kid in my car, Phil, and I’ll drive.” I’m sure at this particular moment Phil felt like he’d joined the clowns-in-a-tiny-car circus act.

But when we all got buckled in, it fit like a glove. We’ve got Atticus.

And we’ve got Marek.

We drove all over downtown St. Pete, pointing out all the breakfasts we’d had over the years. It’s usually at that point on the tour that I turn quietly and seriously to the passenger and point out that I am not a nutcase.

We cruised over the Skyway bridge and back. It’s a lovely, dramatic drive, especially in a car the size of a shoebox like mine is.

A lovely, dramatic, and sleepy ride.

When we got home, Favorite Guest Reviewer Mom handed me a sack of taters to carry around. Ivo had stayed home this morning for some quality mom-time.

And that’s the end of a great Tampa Bay Breakfast morning! Thanks, Phil and Atticus, for joining us!