Since it's St. Patrick's Day, I thought I should share some things about the guy it's named after, who you probably don't know nearly as well as you think you do.
Before you object- here's one fact you probably won't know. He wasn't Irish.
Yeah, no. We don't have a lot of information about the guy's start and whatnot, but he was brought to Ireland as a slave. After 6 years, he escaped and went somewhere, possibly France. After more time I don't know a lot about, he got promoted to Bishop at age 43 and had a dream that the people of Ireland needed him to bring Christianity to them, so he left to preach at them with some effectiveness.
He used shamrocks to explain the trinity, so it seems a bit amusing that everyone is looking for the four-leaf one.
He supposedly banished all snakes from Ireland. It was probably a metaphor for the 'evils' of paganism, since they're considered a sign of the devil from when he took the form of a serpent in Eden. Archeologists say there weren't any snakes then, and there aren't many now, so don't that's kinda a weird choice, but I'll leave that alone.
Everyone knows he's the Patron Saint of Ireland, but apparently he's also the Patron Saint of Nigeria. Yay? Not sure how that happened.
And while everyone knows him for Green...his favorite color was Blue. He was most often associated with blue, but everyone knows Ireland is 80 shades of green, so they switched it over.
So, now that I've told you that the Irish Saint isn't Irish, that the three-leaf clover is the one he liked more than the one we all search for, that green isn't his color, and I assume everyone already knew that he really didn't have anything to do with leprechauns, I'll leave you to the rest of the holiday.
Maybe I should have posted this yesterday so you could grumble at people today, but this way I don't destroy any celebrations you want to do. Life's short, have fun. Even if the holiday and the saint don't match up well.
Sources:
Tourism Ireland-- 10 Things You DIdn't Know about St. Patrick
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