Just an Excuse

Well there ends another St. Patrick's Day in the United States of America. Even though I am not Irish or Catholic, I do not feel that we are honoring this patron saint properly. I suppose there is no harm in finding reasons or excuses to celebrate. I mean, who doesn't like holiday's and parties? I suppose I felt the need to write this post because St. Patrick's Day is the second deadliest day on Minnesota Roads (2nd only to the fourth of July). On average from 2002-2008 11 of the 20 deaths on March 17th were alcohol related. We live down the street from one of the largest gathering places for all of those who use St. Patrick's day as an excuse to get absolutely plastered. O'Garas a St. Paul tradition since 1941 opened it's doors and bar at 8:30 a.m. and kept the party hoppin till about 2:00 a.m.

It was 65 degrees yesterday in Minnesota which is unheard of warm this time of year. So it really brought people out of their holes to participate in the festivities. I took a nice long walk around the lake near the zoo only to come home to the painfully tart smell of skunk wafting through my apartment hallways. Yet no black and white critters to be found. We have a resident Pot-head in our building and as caretakers Chuck and I get to be the fun neighbors who regulate. I think our neighbor confused the traditional four leaf clover, a symbol of St. Patrick's Day with the cannabis leaf... Chuck had to go down and put the kabosh on it.

St. Patrick's day also seems to be an excuse to do the following...

• Shamelessly ask strangers to kiss you because of your heritage
• Wear sassy T-shirts that say things about "getting lucky"
• Dust off your Mardi Gras beads and Shamrocks necklaces
• Shop at Party City
• Eat Lucky Charms for breakfast (Which I WISH I would have done!!)
• Sport those green tights you only wear once a year
• Pinch people
• Put green food coloring in things (my old roommate used to put it in just about everything)
• Do the Jig (or if you are not a very good dancer, it is a good excuse to watch other people do the jig... like Jack Black in the following video that I can't stop laughing about... thanks for posting this Joyce!)

• Eat a big slab of Corned Beef with cabbage.... which is exactly what Chuck and I did.

Hope you all survived St. Patty's Day... till next year.