Did You Know About This?

I was just taking my Netflix DVDs to the post office when I ran smack into the St Patrick's Parade. Even though it's a downtown affair, it's worth mentioning. Now, I'm zero percent Irish, so the whole shebang usually passes by unnoticed. But a parade is tough to ignore. Of course, nothing says "Irish" like the Seafair pirates. Here they are:

They also had their cannon along. It wasn't that glorified shotgun they sometimes use. No, this was the full-on, black-powder muzzle-loader. And it was really super-loud. This is what it looked like about two seconds after they fired it:

There were also friends of Oliver Cromwell:

I'm guessing that there isn't a whole lot of animosity between the orange and the green in this part of the world. I mean, we're not in Boston! Those tensions and bad history don't count for much in Seattle, so let the Ulster folks march.

This was about the most boring thing in the parade - or at least as much as I saw of it. It consisted of little more than a banner and a stroller:

OK, then...

The highlight for me was one of the strangest bands I've ever seen. It was a drum and accordion corps, but they also had cheerleaders. It was all very nice:


And then I left. It would be nice if they made such a big deal out of SS Cyril and Methodius Day, but I won't hold my breath. They chased no snakes anywhere. Instead, they gave their Slavic brethren the Glagolitic alphabet. It was so popular that Slavs who wished for a less cumbersome (Glagolitic is mind-bendingly elaborate) way to communicate immediately went out, stole a bunch of Greek, Latin and Hebrew letters and dubbed it the Cyrillic alphabet. Slavs around the world honor the two to this day for giving them the wrong alphabet. This year, the great day falls on July 5th. Mark your calendars. Anyhow, happy St. Patrick's Parade Day, everybody! "Kiss me, I'm Irish" has a much better ring to it than "Punch me, I'm Ukrainian."