At any other race you get apples, oranges, bananas and water in what they call the recovery area. For the St Patrick's Day race here you get twinkies, cookies and beer. Woo hoo. For the meateaters they had some bratwurst. The race was a pisser. For a 10K you can't just run all out, but for 3 1/2 miles I did (pretty much). I was surprised that even this short race could be so demanding. I was glad to see the finish line. So I had some beer, chatted with some people and then went home for a nap. I was told that I had to join the Eastside Runners Club. The little sleep helped, and since I was still in the Irish spirit and it wasn't raining, I took the bike for a ride and picked up some Guinness. Woo hoo. It's on sale at Fred Meyer. All this and St. Patrick's Day isn't even here yet. My pace was about 6 1/2 minute miles.