Friday Vid Picks: St. Patrick’s Day

While you might get the impression that St. Patrick was the patron saint of violent, homophobic alcoholics, based on the antics at parades from Boston to Chicago, in fact he was a voice for peace who proclaimed in an anti-war Letter to Coroticus, “A murderer cannot go with Christ.” Who knew? But then, he’s never been officially canonized by the pope, so there you go.

Mark Day, a Scottish comedian living in California who claims to regularly get mistaken for Irish by drunken Yanks, muses further on the history of St. Patrick and puts sainthood in terms we Americans can understand — as the A-list and B-list celebrities of the Catholic Church.

The kids over at Invisible Engine present a St. Paddy’s Day Brogue to get you in the bottle-breaking, face smashing, risky sexual encounter mood this holiday season. You could sit around sipping a cuppa and reading Joyce, but I guess nothing says “Irish Pride” like wearing green, getting sozzled and starting a fight or three.

As though the Chicago River wasn’t polluted enough, one of the most enduring and fanciful St. Patrick’s traditions is dumping dye to turn it green. According to this clip, it turns out the greening of the river is not just a wee bit greener, thanks to the green dye being replaced by green food coloring. Presumably the same formula used to ruin good beer.

Speaking of beer, if you’re so happy about a snake-free Ireland that you’ll be drinking until you black out, don’t worry about being too snookered to order another cold one — these mugs flash green when they’ve gone dry. No need to actually be able to see or speak clearly in order to stay topped off.

Okay, okay, I’ll shut up and leave with you with some beer porn. In this case, a demonstration and celebration of the perfect pour of Guinness. Because if you just can’t celebrate Ireland without descending into tipsy reverie, you might as well do it right.