Happy St. Patrick's Day 2013

Did you wear your green??? 

(photo courtesy of turningkey.blogspot.com)

Well, did you? If you didn't, this guy will pinch you!

Today was also the first time I cooked a real corned beef and by real, I mean, not from a can!

But first,  today isn't complete unless we have a clip from this Oscar worthy film and soon to be classic, "Leprechaun - Back 2 Tha Hood":

A note of trivia - Warwick Davis, who played the title character in ALL of the "Leprechaun" movies, also played Willow from "Willow", as well as Wicket the Ewok in "Star Wars, Episode VI - Return of the Jedi" (he was just 11 years old), Professor Filius Flitwick in the Harry Potter movies, and Griphook the Goblin from Gringotts Bank (in the first "Deathly Hallows" movie; the original Griphook was played by Verne "Mini-Me" Troyer).

Every holiday, I rotate my Pez collection. Although there is a rare leprechaun pez out there,

(image from antiquesnavigator.com)

 I unfortunately don't have it. General Mills had a promo (not sure how long ago) of mini Pez dispensers with certain cereal mascots, Lucky the Leprechaun from Lucky Charms, the Trix Rabbit, and the Bee for Honey Nut Cheerios. Where was I when they had that promotion? Asleep at the wheel, probably.  One day, this will be mine (insert evil laughter here).

(image from www.pezheadmonthly.com)

Since I do not have "Lucky the Leprechaun",  I usually just display all of my Pez that have green in them:

From left to right: Diego from "Ice Age", Merida the ass kicking Irish princess/archer from "Brave", The Incredible Hulk, Mike Wazowski from "Monsters Inc", Yoda from "Star Wars" (duh), Rex the Dinosaur from "Toy Story", Ferb from "Phineas and Ferb", The Green Lantern, Mu Lan (also an ass kicker unlike Belle, Ariel, Snow White, Cinderella and their ilk), Slimy Sid (he is a "Glow in the Dark" Halloween ghoul), and in the front,  Samwise Gamgee from "Lord of the Rings".

Merida is the newest Disney Princess Pez. I wholeheartedly despise the Disney Princesses but I relented for this Pez (and Mulan) since they were strong female characters. They weren't weak ass simps who depended on men to save them or need a man to make their life complete (gag gag). Plus, Merida was an ace archer and Mulan could actually fight!

Last year Bert chose the Green Lantern from DC. This year, Marvel's Hulk wins out. I personally feel that the Hulk can kick the Green Lantern's ass any day. Unless he's played by Ryan Reynolds.

Bert hadn't worn that green dress shirt in years!  My green shirt below is safety pinned (can you see it) becasue it was a little too low for my liking (Deletta from Anthropologie bought two years ago). I also have my ring fingers painted green. I had on my Slytherin colors (gunmetal and green).

I didn't have the bracelet on in the photo above, but I was wearing it earlier today. This is an Indonesian beaded bracelet, bought for $3 three years ago from the Rosa Mariposa booth at the San Diego Fair. Their shop is in Little Italy but when they're at the Fair, their prices are dirt cheap!

(bracelet on top of TC's practice fans for dance)

TC wearing my old "Dark Side of the Garden" t-shirt (from Threadless).

That used to be one of my favorite shirts.. Below, Bert's new Adobo shirt, bought for $5 last year from t-shirt vendor,  Island Style at the Parol Festival.

Our lunch -  Slow Cooker Corned Beef with potatoes, carrots, celery, and cabbage (recipe will be forthcoming). Cooking was really "minimal" since the crock pot did all the work!

Later for dessert, Dreyer's Slow Churned Limited Edition Mint Cookie ice cream with Cool Mint Oreos:

I was looking for  green mint ice cream but they didn't have any at Fresh and Easy. The Dreyers slow churned was also lower in fat and calories than the other Mint Cookie flavored ice crea so we got that instead.

The cookies weren't crumbled that finely, but they still tasted good with the ice cream. I was afraid they would taste like toothpaste! It was like a double dose of mint cookie-ness there.

St. Patrick is the patron saint of Ireland, an island country that is home to a few of my favorite Irish bands:

U2:

Quite possibly my favorite U2 song, or perhaps a close tie with "11 O'Clock Tick Tock".

I like this particular version of "New Year's Day" because there's an extra verse and the song is extended. Trivia note - Those were Swedish girls on horseback NOT the members of U2, hence the masks on their faces! The video was filmed in 1982 during a winter in Sweden where sub-zero temperatures are common. This was one of the first videos to get heavy airplay during MTV's early days.

The Boomtown Rats:

Also from 1982 was this song by The Boomtown Rats, "Up All Night", which used to get heavy rotation once 91X started up. This was from their fifth album, "V Deep" which also included the rarely played "Skin on Skin". I remember that N and I used that song for one of our mixtapes; this one was for the "sex" tape (we also included other salaciously minded songs like "Sex, I'm a...." by Berlin, "Grass" by XTC, "Strobelight" by the B-52's;  "Violent Love" by Oingo, and so on. I have it around somewhere! I should dig up that old playlist!)!

I can't forget Thin Lizzy, featuring a black/Irish frontman, Phil Lynott, who unfortunately died of internal complications brought on by his heavy drug use:

Trivia - This traditional Irish song was covered by Metallica in 1998, winning them a Grammy in 2000 for best Hard Rock Performance.

Midge Ure of Ultravox was briefly a member of Thin Lizzy from 1979-1980, playing keyboards, guitar, and providing back vocals. He in fact stepped in to replace guitarist Gary Moore who abruptly quit during their U.S. tour.

Hope you're all enjoying the day so far!