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3/17/2015 - Ahh St. Patrick's Day. It's the designated day to wear green, drink, and fight...AHEM...I mean celebrate Ireland's rich cultural heritage! In this day and age there is no greater St. Patrick's day celebration and parade than in good old Cleveland, Ohio. Doubt my claim??? Well consider this... every year Chicago takes the time and makes the effort to dye their river green to help celebrate. We just don't clean up the algae bloom for a week or so. Point Cleveland.
Savannah, Georgia (the mecca of celebrating different cultures BTW) has one of the biggest St. Paddy's day celebrations in the world... except it's 70 degrees and SUNNY! Those poor gingers will burn to death out there. Now in Cleveland any day in March has a 100% chance of being overcast with 0% chance of seeing the sun. The palest of Irish people can run free outside without any sort of sunscreen. Again... Point Cleveland.
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Now you would think Boston would be the top place to go for St. Patrick's Day parties and shenanigans since, you know -- you've watched TV, movies, and lived in America -- but according to Niche.com you'd be wrong... It f*cking pittsburgh. Yup. Even though it's parade is not as old as ours, 13.5% of their population is Irish and they go ape$hit on social media. Now instead of looking at other lists, I'm going to take this opportunity to player hate on pittsburgh since "they have so much and we have so little". Clevelanders again are guilty of making the most out of the nothing that was left after oh let's say 1950. Not only do we make all of the top 10 lists with only 8% of our population being Irish but we go crazy about it on social media even though most of us are too poor to afford computers or smart phones. Hey pittsburg, you suck. You toll road Nazi a$$holes... Point Cleveland!
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OK, now to Cleveland's legendary St. Patrick's day celebration!...which I attended...looking like a tool. The bad part of looking so old is that 22 year olds look at me like I'm some sort of escaped Alzheimer patient from the old folks home as opposed to the 35 year old douche bag clinging to his youth that I really am. So I got that going for me. Luckily everyone was too drunk to notice my salt-and-pepper hair or protruding beer gut hidden under my overcoat...or that I wasn't wearing pants. OF COURSE I was wearing pants! Green ones actually. Anyways, it was much too cold to be creepy. Seriously cold!
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After I parked in my super secret free parking spot (that's not really secret because I tell everyone about it), I walked right to ground zero for a good time downtown, East 4th Street. It was almost noon and the parade didn't start until 1 so the pedestrian only street was busy but not as crowded as I expected. I walked right through without worry passing classic staples of any alcohol-centric holiday along the way. Favorites like "Ready to pass out at noon man" or "body paint instead of a shirt boy" or "Woo-who girl" and her college friend "Skirt and knee highs chubby lady". Then there's my favorite, "I'm just here to celebrate my heritage and this is really scary old couple". They were all there and they were all getting dogged by the judgmental groups of passerby's. I didn't doddle in too long because I was on a mission to get to my favorite place where I can always get a table and an awesome meal, NoodleCat!
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After a delicious but ultimately gassy Irish themed meal at NoodleCat plus (2) $1 Black Label's, I was ready to go find a seat to watch my 1st St. Paddy's day parade ever! Now long long ago in a (what seems like) galaxy far far away Cleveland had Street Cars or Trolley's. No, not Lolly the Trolley like we have now. Think more along the lines of the San Francisco treat "ding ding" or a Street Car Named Desire...STELLLLLAAAAA!!!! If you look down the major roads in Cleveland and wonder "why in the world are they so wide?!", that's why. Street cars going sometimes in both directions, cars going in both directions, and people all had to be able to fit on the street comfortably. Remember, things happened before you were born and there were more than just cars. Well thanks to good old GM, the street cars are no more and now we have these wider than necessary streets to try to navigate and god forbid try to cross. I tell you this story to show you my state of mind for the next paragraph.
Once I got down Superior a little I saw some open seating areas and thought to myself "Wow, what luck!" I really thought I'd have to stand the entire time. I chose my tree planter and decided to sit down around the E 12th street intersection... on the South Side. Too much detail? Nope. I broke out my phone and started to get my camera ready to snap some great picture for my blog...then the wind blew...and blew... and it was a cold Cleveland wind. But you know what?! I'm a Clevelander! The wind and cold doesn't stop me from having a good time. Hell the only Brown's tickets I can afford are for late December/early January games when there's 8 feet of snow and we're starting a 3rd string QB! Then as I began to look around I noticed that my side of the street was being abandoned for the sunny side of the street. My stubbornness met the start of the parade. Now I'm sunk. I'm the only non-smoker on this side of the street and I have every friggin' cop in Northeast Ohio marching between me and the sunny side of the street. Not to mention the motorcycle cops that are whirring up and down the street at 45 mph at random trying to keep the peace. Then there were the horse cops and the Irish dogs... and the distance between me and the other side of the street that used to carry street cars and cars and people seemed like miles... so I sat and froze. I say that now sniffling as I type.
Other than the cold, the parade was great! It was way longer than I expected too. They had everything an Irishmen ever did represented in one way or another. Accomplishment, senses of pride, stereotypes...it was all in there...well except for candy. The Constitution Day parade in Louisville has candy. Just a thought for next year parade committee. Also, as long as you stay away from the bar areas, this is one of those great things to bring kids to downtown. I'm always looking for those types of things since one of the huge complaints I hear is "there's nothing to do for kids downtown". Here are some pics I took. Click them to see larger sizes:
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After the parade was over I went to the new Heinens to finally get some pictures of the inside. Unfortunately they closed early for some reason so I did what any good man would do...Go to the Casino! After a little over an hour of gambling I walked out about $10 richer and 3 beer drunker. I call that a win/freakin win baby!
I walked home and napped/waited for poor Gina to get home from work. She loves St Patrick's day but had to work until about 8:30 pm. We ended up getting a few drinks in Tremont and headed home. As much as I love Cleveland, these types of events aren't the same without someone to enjoy them with. I try to pretend that I'm a photographer taking pictures for this blog and not out for a good time. It helps but it's certainly not the same...
Well with all of the big ticket events in the past couple of blogs, I haven't had a chance to talk about restaurants we've eaten at, vendors we're friends with, or changes to the city that I enjoy. Maybe next week I'll touch on those. Something always seems to come up though in this great city and that's not a bad thing. Have a great weekend Cleveland and Erin go bragh!
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