Now earlier in the week I visited my best friend Nuala ( pronounced nooo la)
As some people may have guessed Nuala is an Irish name and Nuala herself although a broad Liverpudlian is just one generation away from pure Irish stock......parents who could have been picked literally out of tv's Father Ted or John Wayne's The Quiet Man!
In our salad days, Nuala and I would always enjoy a rollocking good piss up on Paddy's Day. We would meet up with a gaggle of Irish physiotherapists with the fairly complicated names of Grainne (Gron-ya),Dymphna and Hillary and drink copious amounts of whatever around the Irish pubs of Sheffield or indeed Liverpool depending on where we decided to go.
I have never understood the draw of St Patrick's day to non Irish people. Perhaps it is purely a result of some shallow enjoyment of getting pissed out of your head whilst wearing a cheap plastic green hat fashioned into a rough shape of a shamrock.......perhaps it is just a result of some false warm community nostalgia about "the craic"........
or perhaps it is the fact that most people from time to time love to belt out the first verse of The Fields of Athenry with their arms around a group of sweaty strangers as a scruffy man with a beard plays a penny whistle !
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| Our Sheffield slice of Galway The Dog And Partridge |
Tonight I am off out to a colleague's leaving bash in Prestatyn.....I hope the bar that we will be going to isn't decked out in Irish flags and photos of Dana......I am a bit too long in the tooth for all that bollocks!
It is an export by Guinness to boost sales, in the same way Coca Cola invented the red Santa, I think.
ReplyDeleteIn the US, if you don't wear something green on Paddy's day, you get a punch on the nose... To celebrate is obligatory!... even more Guinness sales.
ReplyDeleteA huge percentage of Ontarians have Irish blood in them thanks to the import of the Irish during the potato famines (myself included). And anyway, any excuse for a celebration.
ReplyDeleteYou're never too old for a flag. The Guinness is a different matter though.
ReplyDeleteI used to date a gentleman from NYC and I was dumbfounded how the entire went insane for St. Patty's Day.
ReplyDeleteMay the Luck 'O the Irish be with you!
City.
ReplyDeleteThe entire CITY went insane.
(not that it had far to go!)
"love to belt out the first verse of The Fields of Athenry with their arms around a group of sweaty strangers as a scruffy man with a beard plays a penny whistle !"
ReplyDeleteYou make me nostalgic for Dublin John. My Irish husband will be indulging pints of black velvet whilst watching the rugby, then home to polish off bacon and colcannon.
I was just on ancestry.com checking my Irish grandfather on some other family tree. My god, the Irish had a lot of children. The ubiquitness of such nice people surely explains the pervasivness of the celebration.
ReplyDeleteSorry, but I just don't get the 'everyone is Irish for a day' thing...nope...not at all.
ReplyDeleteJane x
I've often wondered the same thing; why do we get all giddy about St. Patrick's day? Most of us don't really know anything about the holiday. I always suspected it was an excuse to get drunk enough to forget the drear winter weather that just won't release its hold (Growing up in the Snowbelt, I didn't realize some places in the world actually enjoy SPRING in March; we were usually in the middle of a blizzard.)
ReplyDeleteHey, I'm a scruffy man with a beard - and I can play a penny whistle. Which is why I'll be staying well away from sweaty strangers tonight!
ReplyDeleteMy greatgrandparents are Irish on both sides, and also Liverpudlians so I always carry the torch for them.
ReplyDeleteMaiden name "Keefe"
Nawt wrong with the excuse to enjoy a Guinness and wear a Shamrock :)
Enjoy your night out !
~Jo
Funny, I thought the attraction of St Paddy's Day to both Irish and non-Irish was precisely the rollicking good piss-up. Everything else is surely incidental. It's always best to keep well away from Belfast city centre on St P's Day unless you want to fight your way through the drunken hordes (or join them).
ReplyDeleteMost of our supposedly "religious" holidays have gone astray, people just like to celebrate. Which makes me wonder why, instead of trying to do away with holidays like Christmas and Easter, or giving them generic names, we don't just start making a bigger deal of other religions' and cultures' holidays. It could be a whole new market for all the doodads that are required. I see pix on the internet of people in Muslim countries dressing up like Santa Claus. I'm not Irish, I wear green though because I have a lot of it and just to honor the Irish. I'm Polish. Is there a day I should be celebrating instead? Bring on those reasons to celebrate!
ReplyDeleteHope you have a good evening, John.
ReplyDeleteHave a good night out x
ReplyDeleteBest night out I can remember was in Paddy's Bar listening to 'The Two Pats' sing Irish jigs all night.
ReplyDeletePissed as a fart on Guiness, just like evryone else in there, it was brilliant.
Put your green shirt on. Long live Dana!!!XXX
Never took to Guinness, tho' I do like a good 'Black Ale' (or two). There is a fair amount of Irish in our lineage.
ReplyDeleteWhat is the shape of a Shamrock?
ReplyDeleteStrangely, although most Aussies have some Irish blood in their heritage, we don't really "do" St Paddy's Day here ( well in QLD anyway).
ReplyDeleteI'm sure there are pubs and young people somewhere in the city who are happy for a reason to booze up though.
Cheers
And just for the record - I much prefer Dana International to Dana...
ReplyDeleteThey start at 7am here in Michigan. Drinking till the can't stand up. It's a reason to get drunk.
ReplyDeleteOn May 5th, they will all be Mexican for a day. (Cinco deMayo) Go ahead, ask someone what it is...They'll tell you it's the 5th of May but have no idea anything about it or why it's celebrated.
Dymphna? You mean the Dymphna who once lived at Handsworth and worked for a while on A&E at the Hallamshire? I think her husband was called Steve. I remember when they first moved in they had very little furniture and used deckchairs in place of armchairs in their lounge. Hope you didn't end up getting arrested in Prestatyn on your boozy night out.
ReplyDeleteJust a reason to party. Have fun.
ReplyDeleteyp
ReplyDeleteDybs was a physio at the Hallamshire!
Bel Ami - Me too!
ReplyDeleteMy father grew up in a small town in the Texas panhandle, Shamrock, Texas (pop. 2000). Its St. Patrick's day celebration lasts 3 days and I doubt few if any of the residents could give the original reason for the day. (The town got its name from an Irish immigrant in the 1800s.)
ReplyDeleteGrowing up, not wearing green meant a pinch.
Just another day for an excuse to get pissy eyed.
ReplyDeleteThe great attraction to St. Patrick is probably because he was British [grin!]
ReplyDelete