When organizers cancelled this year's St. Patrick's Day Parade in Hoboken, noting the city's "inability to protect our spectators, bands and participants," a few people decided to take matters into their own hands and organize the first Lepre-Con. The pub crawl is scheduled for this Saturday, March 3, but since some Hoboken bars aren't going to open until 11 a.m., there's a kick-off in Manhattan, where you can get drunk much earlier.
The Jersey Journal reports that the "'Pre-Lepre-Con' event will take place at 8 a.m. across the Hudson River in New York City at Feile Bar and Restaurant at 131 West 33rd St. in Manhattan with food and drink specials. The group will then leave to head over to Hoboken at 10:30 a.m. to arrive for the official Lepre-Con bar-hopping." See, the actual Lepre-Con was originally going to start at 9 a.m., but then city officials didn't like that ideas. The parade event was infamous for public debauchery as well as raucous house parties:
So the city implemented the 11 a.m. opening time for bars and emphasized anyone with open containers may be subject to "$2,000 fine and possible community service. The same penalties apply to anyone caught urinating in public."
Organizers say of the later time, "Well, frankly we believe it's a pretty clear signal that City Hall is encouraging house parties to those who want to make a full day of it. While we respect and understand why the bars agreed to this, we feel it will simply encourage house parties to those who want to make a full day of it. So we will continue to provide a responsible alternative to that."
You can see the list of bars the Lepre-Con will be wandering to here—there are drink specials there (as well as Feile) for those wearing official Lepre-Con t-shirts or leprechaun costumes but it's "at the bar's discretion as to whether your costume is 'good enough' to warrant the special offers, so make sure you go all out." Hello, Sexy Leprechaun outfit—be inspired by this Will Ferrell bit:
