THE ORIGIN OF ST. PATRICK'S DAY


 
A lot of people (well, ok, three) think that St. Patrick invented green beer.  Others believe he was the guy who ran all the snakes out of Ireland by whacking them over the head with a fistful of shamrock.  (True, there are no snakes in Ireland, but there ARE politicians and lawyers, which is the next best thing.) 



Still more people believe him to be the lead singer with U2.




St. Patrick was, in fact, the first Irishman in space.  At that time (432 A.D., or 230 if you're using a gas oven), the Irish government (two guys called Mick and a sheep called Stella) decided to embark on a space program to put the first man on the moon.  (They were hoping to eventually colonize the moon and had even come up with the surname of the first lunar family - the Mooneys.)



They advertised in the national newspapers for a monkey to travel on the very first trial space shuttle
but, as fate would have it, there were no monkeys in Ireland and, even if there were, where would they get the money to buy a newspaper?  In desperation, the government advertised for an astronaut, but they hadn't been invented yet so they were forced to take the first guy who showed any interest.






St. Patrick was actually selling shamrock door-to-door and having no luck at all.  Doors hadn't been invented yet but no-one had the heart to tell him.  When he showed up at the space centre (a shed at the end of Seamus Murphy's cabbage field), he was shown into an interview room.  He was asked what he knew about outer space and he replied that he had seen every episode of Star Trek and knew things like Vulcans had pointy ears and were very logical.  In an effort to impress his interviewers he told one of them "I know where Uranus is."  To which the shocked interviewer replied "And I know where yours is!"


They gave him the job - mostly because he was the only one who showed up and he brought his own lunch.  He was led to the launching pad and handed the keys to the ignition.  "Be careful not to throw the throttle into reverse because the rear axel will turn over and the transmission will fall into the chassis, causing multiple oxidation in the thrombublar vortex of the carburetor and the muffler will fall off", he was advised. Take-off was successful and soon St. Patrick was speeding towards the moon and reporting back to base.  "What's it like so far?", they asked him.  "Well, it's awfully cold and dark", he replied. 


They assured him this was normal for outer space until he began complaining about having a carrot sticking in his ear and they realized he was sitting in the fridge.  




They were just about to talk him out when they heard him say "I wonder what this button is for?", followed by a loud scream and an explosion.  Then everything went quiet.

It was concluded that he must have hit the self-destruct button which they had foolishly placed beside the butter.  They hoped he was fast enough to hit the eject button which was positioned beside the butter and behind a bottle of milk. That was the last anyone ever heard of him. 







They searched the skies for days but gave up when their flashlight batteries ran out.  


Since then, numerous unconfirmed "sightings" have been reported.  One woman in Dublin claimed that she stepped out of her shower and came face to face with "a large, hideous, naked thing which screamed at me and disappeared."  It turned out that she had, in fact, caught sight of herself in the mirror.





A man in Texas claimed to have seen St. Patrick and Elvis in a hamburger joint fighting over the deep fried onion rings.



And in a completely unrelated incident, two nuns in Cork breathlessly told the police that they had been out for a quiet walk in the country when a naked man ran up to them and waved his willy at them before running into nearby bushes.  One of the nuns had a stroke but the other one couldn't reach that far.





Whatever the case, it has to be said that no finer Irishman graced the sky with his presence, and every March 17th, Irish people the world over drink a toast to St. Patrick - a man who was truly out of this world.





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