Happy St. Patrick's Day

Okay, I'm not Irish. I'm not Catholic. I drink beer occasionally, but have never desired green beer. For some reason, however, I like the concept of St. Patrick's Day.

St. Patrick's Day is cool. It's been around for a couple hundred years, and it hasn't turned into some ultra commercialized holiday. I spent over $60 on Halloween stuff, and my kids didn't even trick-or-treat. If you're married you better have dropped a wad on Valentine's Day, or you slept on the sofa. Easter and Thanksgiving have less commercial appeal, but ask any grocery store owner the value of tradition on those days. Don't even get me started on Christmas, which now begins in late September.

Unless you own an Irish Pub, St. Patrick's Day isn't extremely commercial. You end up wearing that ugly green tie that Aunt Gertrude gave you in 1978. Some people party hard and sing drinking songs while pounding green beer, but most of us don't. Some cities have parades, particularly those with high Catholic populations in the Northeast, but the parades aren't televised beyond local channels.

It got me thinking, wondering actually, what made St. Patrick worthy of his own Day? I know why Martin Luther King deserves a Day. Washington and Lincoln have to share a Day. St. Valentine invented little folded paper hearts, so I guess that deserves a Day. Columbus got a Day for being very bad at nautical navigation. Jesus gets a couple days each year, but has to share them with an egg-hiding rabbit and a fat chimney sweep in a red velour suit. But what makes a snake charmer from Ireland deserve a day.

So I Googled St. Patrick, and this is what popped up.

Patrick was this dude who was born about 385 A.D., back when clothing was brown and grass was green. He wasn't even a Christian, he was pagan.

So you're an incredibly rich guy back in the day, which only means that you own a horse and a roof that doesn't leak, much. But you need help to sustain your wealth, so you get a bunch of other guys with horses together, and start the recruiting process. Rather than running classified ads in the Sunday paper, you simply ride into town and snatch six or ten strong teenage boys, and make them slaves.

This is what happened to Patrick. During this time he prayed to God, a lot. So would you. Half a dozen years go by, and Patrick (who, by the way, was named Maewyn at the time) escaped. He figured God was his only friend, so he went to stay at God's house, specifically a monastery in Gaul. It was in Gaul that he adopted the Christian name, Patrick.

There he studied over a decade and eventually was appointed the second bishop of Ireland, not the first bishop as many people believe. His personal mission was to convert as many Irish pagans to Christianity as possible. He was incredibly successful, starting churches and schools throughout Ireland.

There are lots of stories about St. Patrick, many of them lore that improve with each telling, and many others that are just complete fiction.

He didn't chase snakes from Ireland. There is no evidence that snakes have ever existed on the Isle. Stories of snakes probably were symbolic of pagans being converted to Christianity.

The Shamrock is a symbol that many attribute to St. Patrick. It's said he used the three leaf version to explain the Holy Trinity. This story could be true, but there isn't a way to prove or dispute it. I'll choose to believe this one.

It's been said that he wore green, but that is unlikely at that time in history. More likely is that the date of St. Patrick's Day is in late spring, symbolized by green.

The date itself, March 17th, is reportedly the date he died (in 461 A.D.) but there is significant doubt as to the year he died, let alone the month and date. More likely is that the date is around the time of the removing of the "cold stone". One of St. Patrick's duties as Bishop would have been to remove the "cold stone" from the river, indicating when it was safe to plant crops. In agricultural societies, this day would have been highly anticipated and celebrated.

I'm not sure if Patrick truly deserves his own Day outside Ireland, but as long as I'm not required by etiquette to do anything beyond wearing green once a year, I'll not object. I look awesome in green anyhow!

Smile, You're on Liquid Camera...

Smile, You're on Liquid Camera... How do you make a better cell phone lens? Just add water.

Is There Playoff Hope for the New York Mets?

And why I'm not paying attention...

The New York Mets beat the Cubs tonight, 2-0. They are 56-54, two games over .500 and only 7½ games behind the Braves. Normally, if this was the case, I'd start paying attention to the sports pages daily, and catching as many games as possible on the telly.

But, this season is different. While they seemingly are still alive, they are actually in last place in the National League East. All five teams have a winning record. All five are ahead of the Padres, the leaders out West. Four of the five have actually led the division at some point this season. (Only the Mets have failed to ever be in first.)

With 54 games left the Houston Astros are the wildcard leader with four National League East teams within 3 games. Eight teams are legitimate contenders for the wild card spot.

It's shaping up to be one of the best runs to the pennant in recent National League history. The American League isn't quite as deep, but whenever the Yankees and Red Sox are only three games apart in first place, there is excitement there too.

If this were any other season, I'd be devouring baseball. But, not this year.

Why? One word. Steroids.

I'm completely burnt out of stories about steroids. Congress is calling special committees. (Aren't we at war? Shouldn't they be fighting terrorism? Heck, my property taxes are too high, and education is still under funded. Shouldn't they be focusing attention elsewhere?) Every sports writer in the nation has written the word steroids or lockout more often in the past eighteen months than they have in the balance of their entire careers.

The Red Sox won the World Series. The White Sox are dominating their division, and clearly have the best team in baseball right now. The National League has more parity than ever before. We should be celebrating baseball for the first time since Mark and Sammy were chasing the record.

Instead, we can't open the sports page, log in to our sports site, and definitely can't watch ESPN without hearing steroids. We, not only, can't celebrate this year, but we are even calling into question past celebration. Was Mark juiced? Was Sammy corked? Is Johnny Damon really Jesus?

I'm sick of it. I'm turning of the television. And just clicking the standings page to get my updates sans steroids.

And please no more stories about when Barry will or won't come back.

I'm Going to Be the Next American Idol

Well, if geeks had an idol, I'm going to be it, or at least make an attempt. My favorite show (yes, it's on G4TV) is Attack of the Show. It's my personal daily retreat into geekdom. I'm going to be the new host!

The show is pretty much made for me. It has segments about software, games, technology news, DVDs, and music. That's all well and good, but even for me, rather boring. What makes this show great is its smart and somewhat cynical sense of humor. It's a show for geeks, by geeks, who also enjoy laughing at geeks.

Anyhow, long story short, one of the three hosts (actually, the one I liked best) left the show rather suddenly a few months ago. They made due with guest hosts from other shows for eight or ten weeks, and now they are actively recruiting.

They decided to hold open casting calls in San Francisco, New York, and their home base of Los Angeles. The LA and San Francisco calls are over, and New York is this weekend.

I'm going.

It sounds incredibly stupid. A guy, and somewhat ugly guy at that, is going to attempt to become a super television star, well, a minor personality on a third or forth tier cable network at least.

"Why?" You ask.

Good question. First, my true love career is broadcasting. I studied radio and television broadcasting for three of my four years in college before an honest and genuine academic adviser told me "Jason, you have a television voice, but a radio face."

He wasn't being cruel. He just knew that television stations don't hire baby-faced guys in wheelchairs with crooked teeth. He also knew that my voice doesn't pop enough to guarantee a steady job in radio.

That was in 1990, and times have changed. I hope the world is nearly ready for the first severely disabled minor celebrity. Maybe not, but I'm going to give it a try.

Here's my pitch... I figure that shortly after I become host, word will start circulating among the population of disabled Americans. Few will believe that any show hired a gimp like me. There are approximately six million severely disabled people in the U.S. If I can capture the Male 12-34 (G4's key demographic) segment, I should persuade maybe 5% of that six million to watch regularly. That's 300,000 new viewers. I haven't been able to secure official television ratings for Attack of the Show but my guesstimate is that 300,000 new viewers would about double the current regular viewers. No other host could hope to have that draw, at least not another unknown.

I'd be the Uhura of the disabled. (Only a true geek would understand.)

Furthermore, my demographic is even better than the typical 12-34 year old males. Heck, all we do is sit around in front of televisions or computers!

Anyhow, Saturday morning I'm off to New York City for the audition. Wish me luck!

Murderball - Rugby for Quadriplegics

I heard about this sport a couple years ago. It sounds very similar to Wheelchair Football, which I played in college. Like rugby, murderball is a little more violent than we played.

Anyhow, they made a documentary about the U.S. para Olympic team and it's in theaters now.

Murderball is currently playing in only a few cities, so I'm almost certain we won't get it around here. I've never traveled to another city for a movie, but I might make an exception.

Murderball Wheelchair Rugby