Another Lesson O'Learned
The Easter Bunny.
Santa Claus.
Leprechauns.
Please tell me y'all have heard of all three. I'm a little worried because this morning I learned something that completely blows my mind--not everybody knows about "the pinch thing."
How is that possible? It doesn't seem to be a regional thing, an age thing, or even a heritage thing. It's just that some people know to wear green on St. Patrick's Day, and some don't. Some know why it's done, and some don't.
People who are oblivious, you HAVE to wear green on St. Patrick's Day. It's true! If you don't, then the leprechauns can see you and they will pinch you. If the leprechauns don't do it, there's probably some dirty old man somewhere who will, and he will have a free pass on that one glorious day of the year. It's in the Weird Rules Associated with Random Holidays manual. Truly.
Proof. (Skip to the last paragraph.)
Consider this your PSA of the month.
Next you're going to tell me that y'all didn't know that a deranged bunny wearing a plaid polyester vest is supposed to hide eggs all over the place for Easter. (By the way, if you think about it, the whole Easter Bunny thing makes considerably less sense than getting pinched if you don't wear green on St. Patrick's Day.)
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Reader Comments (13)
I had no idea what the pinch thing was. I discovered it through twitter then some nice tweeting friends told me about it. I'm Irish and had never heard!
I just o'learned this myself when the boy came home with green marker all over him, because he had to have some green on so he didn't get pinched. i just thought it was some silly kids stuff. I had no idea it was actually a "thing."
I grew up south of New Orleans and I knew about the pinch thing. It's your job to go out in public and demonstrate the importance of wearing the green. Enjoy your pinching next year.
I've always known that if I didn't wear green on St. Patrick's Day that I'd get pinched, but I never knew WHY I was getting pinched. I just thought it was one of those things. I also didn't know that the Easter Bunny is supposed to wear a plaid vest.
I was made fun of at work because I mentioned getting pinched (cuz I was not wearing green) and nobody had heard of it! I heard a bunch of 'what school did you go to?!' I KNEW it wasn't just me!
there were so many people around here that were not wearing green, it was amazing.
Altho last year I went to downtown Cleveland the day of the parade on St. Pat's day and I couldn't understand why there were so many people wearing green (yes I forgot but about 1/3 of my wardrobe has green in it so I lucked out)
I used to host a huge Easter Egg hunt, but the girls got bigger and I lent my 500 eggs to my sister for something and she 'lost' them all.
I didn't know about the "pinch thing", either. And I WAS a leprechaun on St. Patty's Day this year! (Most fun I've had as a mom with my boys. Period.)
i am completely not kidding- I come from an Irish family and so every year we do the corned Beef, Cabbage and beer family dinner (what? you don't?) and my sister and her husband and FOUR children show up. NO ONE is in green. NO ONE. (again, irish family). Genny asks if they are ready to be pinched and my sister FREAKS out. She apparently never caught on to any of this.
she's thirty.
and naturally blond.
I've heard about pinching for non-green wearing on St. Patty's day forever. I can't remember where I first heard it, but I still wear green.
I am just baffled. I just figured Alexis was young and had just been inducted into the the ritual this year. But your (lovely, lovely) commenters - half of them haven't heard! How is that even possible? I need to start pinching more people to get the word out.
Nope. Never heard of it. I'll have to poll my family — again, Irish, 100% on my dad's side. We used to march in the Pittsburgh parade. And, we always wear green on St. Patrick's Day. Because it's about Ireland (ironically), not because we were going to get pinched.
The Easter Bunny (plaid vest or no) makes perfect sense to me, actually. Spring/resurrection/fertility. It all ties in somehow.
:)
I had never heard of the pinch thing before this year. I am Irish and love celebrating St. Patrick's Day. The only thing we ever really talked about in my family is the difference between wearing green and orange on St. Patrick's Day. Green is for Irish Catholics and orange is for the Irish protestants. Despite being protestant we have always worn green and associate that with St. Patrick's Day. After hearing about the pinch thing we looked up all sorts of traditions for St. Patrick's Day and their origin. Apparently eating corned beef is not an Irish thing. They actually eat what is called Irish bacon (similar to Canadian bacon) and when they arrived in the states they could not afford it so they substituted it with corned beef. Corned beef is just an American tradition. Potatoes and cabbage are traditional Irish staples though.
I think I'm a dirty old man, because I found it a great excuse to pinch/feel the biceps of my male coworkers, most of whom didn't wear green. ;-)