St. Patrick's Day Tastes Like Burritos

 I'm so excited to bring Madeline out into the world  this spring.  Look, Maddie Bear, there's life beyond our apartment!  The world is not just a frozen, snowy, inhospitable tundra!

Today was the first truly beautiful day we've had in a long while, so I was all excited to take Madeline for a walk downtown this afternoon.

She was not as excited about our walk as I was.

In my eagerness to bring Maddie out, I temporarily forgot it was St. Patrick's Day.

I don't know what St. Patrick's Day is like in other parts of the country, but around here, it's a pretty big deal.  In Boston, St. Patrick's Day Evacuation Day is even a real holiday so people don't have to worry about work getting in the way of their drinking...at 9 am.  

Imagine my surprise to find that the usual corner people that grace our neighborhood were transformed into gangs of drunk leprechauns clad head to toe in green.  Lots of them.

I pushed the stroller through them and around them, careful not to squish any under the wheels. (Leprechauns are tiny.)  I was worried they'd notice that we weren't wearing green and start pelting me with Lucky Charms, but I think they saw our red hair and pale, pale skin and assumed that we were leprechauns too.  

Besides, they were probably too distracted by the hoards of Irish step dancers and random dude dressed as a parrot to take any notice of us.  (I was too embarrassed to take a picture of the parrot man until I realized that he was the one dressed as a parrot, but by then, he had vanished.)

Anyhow, Madeline and I walked around the block before I decided to start heading back toward the apartment because things were a little too intense for a nice, peaceful walk with my gal.

Real conversation I heard while on the sidewalk:

Tall, drunk girl in knee-high black boots: "Look, Dave, that's where I got jumped!"  She points at the middle of the street in front of a downtown bar.

Second tall, drunk girl in knee-high black boots talking to some other dude: "Oh yea, look that's where she got jumped that night by that guy who got the **bleep** kicked out of him."

Hmmm.  It may be time to move.

At least Madeline found the gangs of drunk leprechauns funny.

Don't get any ideas about becoming a corner person, Madeline...we're moving.

On our way back to the apartment, I stopped to get a St. Patty's Day burrito to go.   Madeline was not as excited about my burrito as I was.

We took my burrito to a nearby park, far from the hoards of drunk leprechauns.  The grass was wet, so I found myself sitting in the middle of a large stage used for summer concerts eating my burrito for an audience of no one.

Madeline fell asleep in the warm sunshine.

I sat there and stuffed my face, enjoying the small patch of nature surrounded by our little city, not at all saddened by the fact that I will never again be a part of the gang of leprechauns a few blocks over.  

 A kite stuck in a tree!  A sure sign of spring!