As I approached the corner of Erkelenzdamm, I knew I was in for trouble. In the bar before the turn were at least ten customers--middle-aged men on holiday, chain-smoking and drinking top shelf Scotch. If these guys weren't next door, then next door must be...

...uncomfortably crowded, which it was. Murray's doesn't allow smoking inside until after midnight and their customers know this, so when one sees that their enormous patio is almost full on a freezing March night, one knows immediately that the place is stuffed to the gills with English speaking, Guinness-swilling ex-pats and the Germans who tolerate them.

Luckily, as soon as I walked in the door, I spotted my girls Laura and Lucy sitting at the bar. Lucy, who used to manage Murray's, asked me immediately what I'd like to drink and when I replied with a firm "uhhh hmmm, well I dunno, ummmmm" she ordered me a Guinness. For the record, I despise Guinness, and said so. Well, maybe not like that. Maybe more like, "Ha ha, I fuckin' HATE Guinness." She didn't seem to care, so I decided that she was buying the drink for me. Wrong. The bartender asked for €4; luckily Laura had cash.

Not a great start to the evening, but hell, I'm in the mood to be festive and choke down a beer on which the head is the best part (not a good sign) if it brings me that much closer to getting in the Saint Paddy's mood; I've got on my green hoodie--I'm ready to party. Things are going well, despite my being shoved and cajoled about, which I usually can't stand, but, what the hell, I'm drinking fucking puke beer and packed into a sardine can with a bunch of tourists... might as well make the best of it.

As you can see, the place is full (this photo actually doesn't give justice to how standing-room-only it was), but that's no reason to be impolite--check the look on the face of the kid in the beige beanie trying to get through the crowd. He is obviously attempting to make himself as small as possible, to avoid spilling his drink or those of others, to avoid shoving anybody--in other words, to avoid a fight.

Not all patrons were as polite that night however. One guy, a huge, eight-foot-tall monstrosity of a man, kept shoving Laura until I got pissed off enough to ask him politely if someone was shoving him and if that's why he was shoving her. He answered that the bar was full i.e. "tough shit". I told him in my sweetest possible voice that shoving's not nice, we don't like shoving, and he said--ha--"well I don't like your loudmouthed approach." Evidently he wanted me to get loud, so I indulged him, and with both hands pushed big apelike ass out of our space. Holy crap did that dude weigh a ton.

St. Paddy's, after that, turned out to be a real fucking drag. Not because of the nasty ape (there was some other wasted pushing-type girls later, but they were smaller and more female and thus less likely to incur my wrath) but because, simply put, there were too many fucking Irish people there. Working there, drinking there, performing acoustic karaoke there. Bummer city. Those who were not Irish were either Brits aged 23 - 40 (somewhere around 40 - dead in American years... God how they "mature" at such a different rate) or North Americans aged 18 - 30 i.e. clueless kids running up their parents' credit card bills on their first Overseas Experience. The Yank and Snow-Yank irritation factor is easy to figure out, but if you've never been in a bar full of grownup British people you have no idea how absolutely fucking dull and alchoholic they are.

I mean, it's St. Paddy's for Chrissake... where are the Girls Gone Wild, the fucked-up frat boys, the Rohypnol-armed cougars, anyone... fun? Nope, it was just a bunch of "authentic" types sitting around drinking warm, watered-down Guinness at four euro a pop and swapping pub stories. Yawn.

I left and walked home at about four in the morning. You know a party's a wash when you've drunk your weight in beer and you're still not drunk. Or when you've spent the last two hours watching sloppy Irish people scour the floors for remnants of forgotten pussy. I swear, if even one person had worn a "Kiss Me I'm Irish" tshirt the night could have been saved.

Next year I think I'll go out for Mexican and drink Dos Equis instead of going out for Irish and drinking over-priced, under-delicious beer.