Carrick to Calgary

Many Happy Returns of St Paddy's Day to ya, begorrah! Ah, the Luck of the Oirish! May you be in heaven a half an hour before the devil knows you're dead etc etc. It snowed heavily here during the night and we got another 4 or 5 cm of snow, so it's more white here than green at the moment. More white stuff forecast to welcome the Robsons next week, too!

Well, it's St Paddy's Day in Canada, and it's much more of a big deal here than it ever was at home. Everyone's wearing something green, lots of people have shamrocks on their clothes, or shamrock posters up in their office and it's all just a bit Irish today. Whew! It's a bit much to take, to be honest. My boss has an enormous green hat on today with a huge shamrock on it too. I even have my little shamrocky OR cap on today. It's infectious, I tell ya! Where did I leave me shillellagh? Hope everyone's having a great Bank Holiday back home!

Great St Paddy's story from Seattle. Apparently they have a big parade on the Sunday before March 17, and they invite various dignitaries from the Old Country, including the mayor of Lisburn, a fine fellow called Cecil Calvert (isn't that just a great Lisburn-type name? No Cecils over here in Canada). Seems Lisburn has been sending their mayors over for the parade on a bit of a junket for the last few years, but this year the mayor he decided to do something a bit different...


Mayor Cecil Calvert, our hero

The Seattle Times reported what happened next:


At the start, it looked as if the 34th annual St. Patrick's Day Parade would provide the usual afternoon of family fun, with marching bands and dancing leprechauns to honor the patron saint of the Emerald Isle.
Then a dignitary from the British territory of Northern Ireland — invited by parade sponsors to help lead the procession through downtown — raised the British Union Jack, and several spectators got their Irish up, hurling objects and expletives at him during the milelong march.
To Irish Americans who object to the British rule of Northern Ireland, carrying that flag was considered the equivalent of "waving the Confederate flag at a Martin Luther King march," several Irish American community groups said yesterday.
Lisburn Mayor Cecil Calvert, appeared unfazed, even as passers-by got in his face and yelled in his ears. One woman tried to knock the flag out of his hands.
"This is a slap in the face. That flag represents the military occupation of Ireland," said Jenna Stephens, who paraded with the Committee for Truth and Justice in Ireland.
Calvert said he was merely celebrating St. Patrick's Day like everyone else. The holiday, he said, "is not just for the nationalist community."


And the moral of the story?
1. St Patrick's Day is not just for Nationalists, Republicans and Irish-Americans. Think about who St Patrick actually was and when he lived.

2. Henry McBigot is alive and well and living in Seattle. Land of the free, my ass.

(Check out another blog's tale on the boul' Cecil here).

So in honour of St Patrick and our wee Cecil, here is Carrick to Calgary's own Union Jack, raised high and proud on this, St Patrick's Day 2005:



Cheers!