Happy St. Patrick's Day 2008!

I'm so happy St' Patrick's day is here again. The one day a year I can convince a large number of my coworkers to join me in some good Irish cheer. Every year I celebrate at the office by making a large pot of coffee, bringing in some whipping (or whipped) cream and a bottle of Irish Whiskey. I have a feeling that Guinness might make an appearance as well.

This year, in honor of Bushmills 400th anniversary, I wll be making them with Bushmills Original Irish Whiskey. I was considering going with Bushmills Black Bush or Bushmills Malt 10 but settled on the Bushmills Original for economic reasons.Not the least of which is that I can get a full liter of Original for less than a 750ml of the other two. Also just to sweeten the deal a little bit more, I'll bring in the Carolan's Irish Cream. I normally stock Bailey's Irish Cream but I'm out at the moment and the Carolan's was a very good deal at Christmas.

Irish Coffee is a lovely new old tradition. I've talked before here, here, and here about the joys and variations of this particular cocktail so I need not go into the details of its construction.

This year I was overjoyed to hear that the Irish bishops had moved St. Patrick's day back to the 15th because Easter is so early. This means that we get to celebrate twice! The secular world has settled on a data and we'll stick with that. We did have a small celebration on Saturday and we will again on Monday.

I also took a little time this year to look into my own Irish provenance. My personal heritage is quite muddled. I have notable traces of Portuguese, Bohemian Jew, British, Pennsylvania Deutsch etc. In there also is the Kenworthy family which has deep roots in Lancashire. Through the Kenworthys there is a Lady Adeline Murray, my grandmother's grandmother's grandmother If I remember correctly. And further back there's notes of an O'Reilly. So while I still have work to do proving it, and my kids are more Irish than I am, I can claim some heritage.

So, Happy St. Patrick's Day! Grab a free key chain, go vote to make 3/17 a national holiday here and vote for Bushmills Twin City In America.