Today is St. Patrick’s Day and Camera Girl’s birthday. Usually we celebrate with corned beef and cabbage and I bring out my bag pipes and kilt and parade through the grounds of the Compound at 6am, noon and 6pm. Well maybe I ,made that last part up.
Camera Girl hates when anyone mentions her birthday, so I make a fuss about it just to annoy her. It’s one of the joys of marriage, irritating your spouse.
Back in the old days New York City had a very important St. Patrick Day’s parade that involved tens of thousands of Irish policemen and firemen dressed in kilts and playing bagpipes. On WPIX, Channel 11 they would have a televised broadcast of the parade usually hosted by “Captain” Jack McCarthy. Captain Jack was the television host of the kids television shows that played Popeye the Sailor Man cartoons. I think at one time he used to host the Three Stooges show but that got handed off to the other Irish tv host Officer Joe Bolton who wore a police officer’s uniform and twirled a billy club.
Irish culture in New York City back in the late ’50’s and early ’60’s was extremely stereotyped apparently.
One time Officer Joe Bolton showed up at the parish carnival to sign autographs and he dragged along Moe Howard of Stooges fame. Moe looked awful. Apparently the Stooge lifestyle was running down at that point. I didn’t try to get Moe’s autograph. But I listened to Officer Joe playing a medley of songs on his banjo.
So all that being said, I wonder if St. Patrick’s Day still means anything to the Irish in America. Sure, it’s been turned into an excuse to get drunk like Cinco de Mayo and Super Bowl Sunday but do Irish Americans still celebrate it? I wonder.
Well anyway, it’s Camera Girl’s birthday and that’s a big deal in this house. We’ll have our traditional dinner and I’ll put on the Quiet Man as a tribute to Irish American cultural history. That’ll have to do.
The Quiet Man – Excellent movie.
Yes, and I think the supporting cast makes the movie. Maureen O’Hara, Barry Fitzgerald, Ward Bond, Victor McLaglen. Perfect. My favorite line is when Barry Fitzgerald see the broken bed in Thornton’s house after the wedding and declares, “Homeric!”
Mine is “The drinks are on the house!”
“Well they are.”
I think the scenery plays a big roll in the movie as well.
Sadly, it is uncredited.
Is the actor who played the bartender uncredited?
Don’t know. I was making a lame joke about the scenery not getting a film credit.
My misunderstanding. You wrote scenery, I misread it as scene. Yeah, the Irish countryside looked good.