As we reported Saturday evening, the official South Side Irish St. Patrick's Day parade technically is not dead. Eight people and one float marched the entire parade route from 103rd Street to 115th Street, except this year they stuck to the sidewalk on the east side of Western.

The float, a Radio Flyer decorated in green and bearing the name "Wee Wee Folks," carried honorary Grand Marshal Patrick Thomas Coakley - the grandson of parade co-founder Pat Coakley.

Although few nearby bar patrons took notice of the parade, passing motorists sounded their horns and waved. Despite the cute factor - recalling the original parade when the Coakley and Hendry children marched around the 10900 block at Talman and Washtenaw - the 32nd annual parade was a sort of legal necessity.

"We're exercising our right to march. To maintain the parade permit, we have to continue to march," South Side Irish Parade committee member Bill Letz told me. Otherwise, the committee would lose the permit, essentially allowing anyone else to apply for it.

As for next year's plans - considering the word is now out that the parade will have to continue - Letz told me that he wasn't sure. "We'll have to wait and see."