I've never gotten too excited about St. Patrick's Day.

The reason is twofold. First, my various schedules never really allowed time for much green-clad shenanigan-ing; when it did, it was nearly always at night. Second, I have no interest in hitting the town during prime-time reveling hours. I've been out to bars before where I've literally been shoulder to shoulder with my fellow patrons, and the experience tends to suck.

So, my curiosity was piqued when the opportunity presented itself to check out a few West Side Irish pubs on this side of the noon hour.

I decided to stop off at Mo's Irish Pub in Wauwatosa to investigate the whole Irish breakfast thing. The crowd was decent, but more in the traditional pub way you'd expect at 8 a.m. The tents were set up for the long alcohol-fueled night to come, but for now the people kept it low-key with their breakfasts and a few drinks.

I wish I hadn't read up on the traditional Irish breakfast before I went in for it. I gave both black and white pudding the old college try, but only because I know it's silly of me to be weirded out by food that has what are probably fewer off-putting ingredients than your average hot dog. I won't go into detail, but if you're interested, you can find the Wiki articles for black and white pudding here and here.

All in all, it was very good, though it's pretty hard to screw up eggs, sausage and toast. I was kind of jealous of the kid at the next table over who ordered the Lucky Charms, though. I caught myself before I could indulge in any breakfast marshmallows and headed over to O'Connor's Perfect Pint on Greenfield Avenue for a drink.

My second and last stop had the typical bar atmosphere in spades (clovers?). They, too, had the tents prepped and ready for the green beer-soaked night ahead, but at 9 a.m. there were only a few outdoorsy folks. A comfortable crowd had taken up in the main bar area -- just enough to be busy but not so bad that I didn't have an easy time of getting my Strongbow from a bartender.

Other than the wider-than-usual green-ness of the place, it was business as usual at O'Connor's. I finished my drink and clocked my official St. Patrick's Day festing in at two hours. Respectable, and just enough to satisfy whatever small part of me that is Irish.