A Danny Boy Playlist

I went to a St. Patrick's Day Party at a friend's house last year and was subjected to 76 different versions of Danny Boy. There were versions that took me to the edge (of tears), and versions that took me to the ledge, moments the song took me to Galway Bay, and others that felt more Guantanamo Bay. Overall, it was an interesting experiment and an excellent party gimmick.

If you'd like to create a comprehensive Danny Boy playlist, you can find a decent list of recordings of Danny Boy by notable artists on Wikipedia. My two favorite versions are by Sinéad O'Connor and Johnny Cash—both a little raw, world-weary, and sad. Other notable versions are by Christy Moore, Shane MacGowan, Judy Garland, and of course, Elvis, and I love a good instrumental version. Also, I can't believe I'm saying this, but I quite liked Michael McDonald's version on Natalie MacMaster's album.

I pulled together a playlist of thirty versions of Danny Boy (just the tip of the iceberg) on Amazon, if you'd like to be a one-trick-DJ at your St. Patrick's Day Party. Trust me, your friends will be talking about it for days, and singing about it for weeks!



And here's Sinéad O'Connor singing along to Davy Spillane's Uileann pipes (close your eyes to cheesy slideshow and just listen):

The Secret of Kells

I've got spasms in my fingers, toes, knees, and eyes after crossing them all weekend in the hopes that a little-known Irish animated feature would win a big award last night. Nominated for Best Animated Feature Film, The Secret of Kells—directed by Tomm Moore and Nora Twomey—is a gorgeously animated tale of a medieval boy monk, Brendan, who must fight vikings and a serpent god to find a crystal and complete the legendary Book of Kells.
The brave little Brendan took on dangerous mythical creatures and hordes of vicious vikings, but when it came to securing an Oscar, he was umbrella-smacked by an old square man who went Up.

Still, it was great to see a bright Hollywood spotlight on an enchanting Irish tale. Of course, I didn't get to see it before the Oscars, because I'm never quite that on-the-ball, but I'm off to see it today. I'm loving the fact that the animation is primarily hand drawn (with computer-generated elements), and it's only 75 minutes—which feels like a short these days. Mostly, I'm swooning at the intoxicating colors, shapes, and patterns of the movie, heavily influenced by medieval art and The Book of Kells.

Here are a few film stills courtesy of TheSecretofKells.com

Hey, if you're looking for an authentic outing for St. Patrick's Day, why not seek out this film, support some Irish animators, and get a lesson in ancient history while you're at it!

Hairy Baby Irish T-Shirts

I've been a bit of a Mrs. Tee this week, pitying the fool who'd dress in cheesy Irish shirts, and mostly just thinking it's a pity that there aren't that many interesting tee options for St. Patrick's Day. Well, the pity party is over, thanks to Hairy Baby. Hands down my favorite t-shirt options for St. Patrick's Day ... and every other day, too.
Love the idea of walking into a pub on St. Patrick's Day with a shirt that says "What time is mass?" Also love this original Guaranteed Irish symbol shirt; if you've ever lived it Ireland you'll recognize it as the seal of authentic Irish. It's slapped on Irish products to encourage Irish people to take pride in buying Irish and supporting their own. In short, this tee makes you look authentic, too.

Speaking of authentic, you can't get more authentic than an Irish t-shirt made in Ireland and in Irish language ...

Impress everyone with your grasp of the native tongue by asking if you have permission to go to the bathroom (we always had to ask this in Irish in school!) and four random Irish words (quiet, road, girl, milk) that will be familiar to natives who haven't spoken a word of Irish since childhood.

You can probably guess the translations, but clockwise from top left: Say hello to my little friend; Go ahead, make my day punk; Luke, I am your father, and Are you talking to me? Irish speakers will get a good laugh, and non-Irish will want to buy you a drink (and maybe even your shirt!)

Okay, so I'm tempted to show Hairy Baby's complete collection here, but maybe you should go check them out for yourself. All shirts are EUR 25, available in several colors, and printed in Co. Cork on organic cotton. Great gifts.

HairyBaby.ie

Kick Me I'm Irish

I wish I could adopt a speak-no-evil policy when it comes to less desirable Paddy's Day tees, but I can't; It's Lent and I need to feed at least one bad habit. A few weeks ago I saw that Spreadshirt was hosting a St. Patrick's Day t-shirt design competition. I kind of wish I hadn't remembered to check back on the winning designs ...

The 3 winners

Okay, the "see the last snake of Ireland" shirt actually made me laugh (my dirty-old-lady laugh)—it's a good choice for a guy inviting conversation with strangers, and trying to make a bit of money at the same time. I just don't get what's so winning about the other two designs ... I guess the pea-green pin-up appeals to a biker set while the silly beer-shamrock argyle pattern appeals to a bicycle set?

There were so many "great designs submitted to the contest" that Spreadshirt decided to award 3 Honorable Mentions:

The runners-up

So, I can see the immediate appeal in the middle design (for college kids), and I can even sympathize with the notion of vomiting shamrocks. I think the leprechaun design is whatever and nothing new, and the last design—cactus waving to shamrock—is actually kind of cute. I can't see myself ever wearing it, though if someone else was wearing it, I can imagine myself (three pints to the wind) trying to create a story to go with this scene.

Danger! Do not wear zone...
A few other non-options from Spreadshirt.com
If you think my taste is up my arse and these t-shirts are simply thebomb.com, then you should [get your head/eyes checked] use the coupon "Marchsale" to get 15% off at Spreadshirt.com.

Custom Map Collages

The other day I wrote about modern ways to map your heritage, and I thought of this topic again this morning when I found these embroidered map collages by Maine-based interdisciplinary artist, Shannon Rankin. I really love the idea of illustrating the coming together of two people/heritages using vintage maps and embroidery. It would make for a great engagement gift, interesting wedding-stationery design, and a beautiful piece of art in any home.

Rankin creates custom collages so you can commission shapes other than hearts (i.e., hands, heads, feet, etc.) and contact her with specific map and color requests. I love the idea of creating one with multiple connected hearts to represent a family tree—especially a far-flung family like mine with members in different parts of Ireland, America, Australia, and South Africa (using maps from each place). Or, what about a trail of connected hearts to represent all the places you've lived in your life? Makes me want to get crafty with my road maps of Ireland ...
Custom maps are $45—$100.

Selflesh.etsy.com
Selflesh.blogspot.com

Tee and Toast Irish Tees

Mission: Find uncheesy alternatives to Kiss-Me-I'm-Irish tees
Destination: Tee and Toast

I just came across Belfast-based, funky t-shirt brand Tee and Toast, and I'm loving their cute and uncheesy tees. For me, the tee-test is always "Can I wear this on March 18th?", and the answer here is a definite yes, punctuated with a vigorous nod (and a touch-wood for the superstitious who don't take surviving St. Patrick's Day for granted).

I love soda bread so much that it makes absolute sense to advertise it across my chest. Never know, someone might make it for me if I wear this shirt.

I also love potatoes. I like them mashed, roasted, boiled, and fried. I might have to get this shirt in every color (choco, tango, grey, yellow, and green).

No denying the fact that I heart tea, toast, and Fig Rolls, too.

If tea, toast, and fig-roll references are too subtle for you, you might like this Shamrocker shirt. Must wear it with an attitude; must not wear it with a leprechaun hat. Available in tango, black, and two shades of green.

Nice shirts and nice opportunity to support a small Irish business.
All shirts are £ 20.00 (about US$30). I'll definitely be back for a good root around as they have other tees, hoodies, shopping bags, and a ton of fun tea-goodies, too.
TeeAndToast.com

Shamrock Ticings

I enjoy a good cupcake. I don't care if they're pretty. Actually, I don't even notice if they're pretty, possibly because my eyes are closed, probably because I don't pause very long before shoveling them into me. Still, other people appreciate pretty cupcakes and if you like to impress other people, you'll appreciate Ticings.

They're thin sheets of edible icing in pretty (uncheesy) designs, that allow you to create couture-looking cupcakes in an instant. In short, they're edible cheats.
When I first started looking into Ticings (to feature over on FoundItLovedIt today), I was a little surprised, and then offended, that they didn't have a big green shamrock Ticing (in a you're-damned-if-you-do-shamrock and damned-if-you-don't-shamrock kind of way). Anyway, I dropped the nice Ticings people a line, and by the end of the day they had a shamrock Ticing design on their site. (They could have had a design in the works, or I could have been a cupcake-design-generator. Sigh.) It's really quite nice isn't it? Pretty. Subtle. Stylish. Sweet.

I'd add in these designs, too, to keep things interesting.
Go forth and impress.

$15.95 per sheet

Vintage T-shirts for St. Patrick's Day

I'm a big fan of Worn Free's vintage reproduction tees; they're cool, soft, and look like something you scored from a vintage store in the East Village (minus the sweat-stains, moth holes, and rips). In considering t-shirt options for St. Patrick's Day, I remembered these two from Worn Free; love that they are not-your-average-Paddy choices!

If you're looking to punk up your Paddy's Day outfit, you might like this Dublin Sound Studios tee, originally made famous by the "Godfather of Punk," Iggy Pop. It's a cool shirt, and unlike the "I-rish I was Irish" tees everyone else will be wearing, you'll actually wear this one again, and again. Available in black or green. $49.95

Why wear a shamrock when you can wear a dragon? I'm loving this cool dragon shirt originally created by Irish artist, Jim Fitzpatrick for Thin Lizzy frontman, Phil Lynott. Fitzpatrick created tons of cool album covers (including the Chinese dragon imagery for the album Chinatown), flashing logos, black-and-white designs, T-shirts, tour jackets, and photographs in his twelve-year collaboration with Thin Lizzy. It's like your own private nod to Irish music and art. $49.95
Sidenote: If you really want to show off, you might want to let people know that the Fitzpatrick who designed this shirt, is the same Fitzpatrick who designed the infamous t-shirt of Cuban revolutionary, Che Guevara.

WornFree.com

Garlic Chip and Cheese

I need onion rings and a grilled cheese (with onion) when I'm hungover. I need cornflakes with hot milk when I'm tired. I need garlic chip and cheese when my father dies.

I can't say I needed it because it was something we usually ate together, or because it was his favorite thing to eat. Truth is, I don't even know if my father liked garlic chip and cheese. But three days after burying my father, and the night before I left my home in Ireland to come back to my home in New York, all I could feel was the absence of garlic chip and cheese. I always eat garlic chip and cheese when I go home, and this time I hadn't.
It was nothing and everything.

My brother's house is a twenty-minute drive from the nearest chipper, and no-one else wanted chips. We were all tired from a long week of shaking hands and shaking heads. I was too tired to force the issue. I wish I'd insisted, because maybe then I wouldn't have spent the night in my room crying (that I might never have garlic chip and cheese again). If I'd had forty-minutes alone with my older brother and that hot steamy mass of chips and mayo with melted cheese, I would have slept better. I wouldn't have argued with my mother the next morning. I would have been less angry at everyone around me. I would have shopped in Duty-Free. I wouldn't have cried like a lonely immigrant as the plane pulled away from Ireland.

It's my father's month's mind mass today. I can't go, so I made myself garlic chip and cheese (even though I have a feeling he probably hated garlic). For something consumed so widely in Ireland, it's impossible to find a recipe for it; I'm wondering now if it's an Irish culinary secret (like the fact that no-one eats corned beef and cabbage).

I decided to wing it.

I sliced up some russet potatoes. Tossed them with a little oil and salt. Baked them in the oven for ages and ages (1 hour) ...

... until they were crispy.

In the meantime, I kept adding minced garlic to a bowl of mayonnaise until the garlic was borderline overpowering the mayo (4 tbsp to 1 cup). I added a little warm water to thin the dip/sauce a little. I might have added a little lemon juice, but I didn't have any.

I put some of the garlic mayo in a bowl to dip the fries in, and sprinkled a little parsley on top.

I love how rugged homemade chips look when wrapped in brown paper.

In fact, I think these are downright sexy salty chips.

I put some fries back in the oven with a little garlic mayo on top and a handful of shredded cheese. I'm not actually sure you're supposed to cook mayo. If I had a cooking sense, it might have been waving a red flag right about there, but I don't, so it didn't, and I shoveled it all into me before I could tell if it was going to make me sick, or not.

Actually, it was half-decent.

It didn't make me feel sick at all.
Though, it didn't make me feel better either ...

The Irish T-Shirt Shop

How I wish Stacy and Clinton would devote an episode of What Not To Wear to What Not to Wear on St. Patrick's Day. I guess I can see why they don't; it's pretty easy to point out what not to wear on Paddy's Day, but who the hell knows what you should wear?

The best and easiest choice is probably a t-shirt. I've had t-shirts made in the past, and if I can get my act together in time this year I'll do the same. Still, I always like to see if there are any new alternatives to the Kiss-Me-I'm Irish standby—they make good gifts.

I found The Irish T-shirt Shop this morning and I'm liking their shirts featuring popular Irish phrases and slang. Here are a few of my favorites (all about $18.50 and available in green or white):

Love this Eejit shirt—"Eejit" means idiot (you can also buy a "Feckin Eejit" shirt). An Irishman walks into the bar" references the first line of every Irish joke. Besides, where else would he be going?

"Suckin' Diesel" is a common slang for "doing well," i.e., "How'r'ye now?" "Ah sure I'm suckin' diesel." "Póg mo thóin" is Irish for "kiss my arse!"
"How's she cuttin?" means "how's it going?" "Nuns! Nuns! Reverse! Reverse!" is a classic line, taken from hugely popular and hilarious Irish TV show, Father Ted. You don't have to be a Father-Ted fan to find it funny, though!

irishtshirtshop.bigcartel.com

Calling All Paddys, Patricks, Pats, and Patricias!

They say everyone's a Paddy on St. Patrick's Day, but this year everyone will be wishing they really were a Paddy (or a Patrick, Pat, Patricia, or Patrice). To celebrate the tenth anniversary of opening their doors to the public, the Guinness Storehouse will present anyone named Patrick (or any variant of the name) with a special complimentary "VIP Pass" (Very Important Patrick Pass) into their St. Patrick’s Day Festival. Non-Paddys are welcome, too, but you'll have to pay €15.
Festivities include fire-jugglers, street performers, Irish groups Rattle and Hum, Sliotar, and The Gravel Walk, musician Jimmy Smyth, Irish celeb DJs, a Céilí Mór, and a personal welcome from Arthur and Olivia Guinness characters. Visiting Paddies will be invited to taste Guinness variants—Foreign Extra Stout and Extra Stout, to sample Guinness brown bread with smoked salmon, along with other Guinness-inspired recipes (wonder if they'll have my cupcakes), they'll learn how to pour the perfect pint of Guinness, and they get to take home a hand drawn caricature of themselves enjoying same perfect pint.

Wonder if it's too late to consider a name change now ... I want that Very Important Paddy pass!

More info at Guinness-Storehouse.com

Mapping Your Heritage the Modern Way

If I didn't have such a bad sense of direction, I'd be a cartographer. Yes, I might not be able to follow a map very well, but oh how I love to look at them. I've been thinking about maps a lot lately as a way to represent where you come from. Sure, you can go the Erin-go-Bragh tattoo, t-shirt, and tea-towel route, throw in a few flags, a bumper sticker on your arse, and a shamrock sticker on your forehead and no one can question your roots (though they might question your taste). Or, you can take a less skididdlyeeidledoodle approach and incorporate some maps into your decor for a subtle—and yes, stylish—nod to your heritage.

Vintage maps of Ireland are fairly easy to come by (maybe I'll feature a few options soon) and they're fine, but if you're a modern Irish man or woman, you might appreciate some less-cliché wall-candy!

Studio KMO

Karen O'Leary of Studio KMO decided that if she cut away all the unnecessary clutter on a city map, it would reveal so much more about a city. It does; it reveals that you can take something common and make it beautiful. By painstakingly eliminating the blocks, parks, and bodies of water on a map, she reveals the main arteries—and bones—of a city, contrasting positive and negative space, and at the same time creating intricate works of art. I'm really loving her 26" x 19 ½" papercut map of Dublin (shown above against a black background)—it would look amazing framed and set against an interesting background. Handcut map $340.

O'Leary's Pen and Paper series deconstructs the city map even further, simplifying the map to a series of thin vertical lines. Her handdrawn San Francisco, Paris, and London maps are especially interesting in this form, as is the Dublin map (shown above). Think this series would make a fabulous postcard set. Original handdrawn (and signed) pen and paper maps are available for $140; prints for $35.

StudioKMO.etsy

Ork Posters

I'm already a proud owner of Ork's Brooklyn typographic poster, and seriously, I love it and actually use it to get my neighb-bearings on occasion. Ork posters are well designed, original, and modern maps depicting a city's neighborhoods typographically. They're a great option for representing your American side of the family/roots. I've emailed Ork to see if they might consider creating an Ireland map in the near future—I want/need/have to have one, and I think lots of other people might want one, too.
Ork responded: "We'd like to add some more cities before we moved on to something like countries, but yes Ireland would be a good one to outline all the counties."
That's a maybe. (Ahem, maybe you should let them know you're interested, too!)

OrkPosters.com

Haptic Lab

Brooklyn-based architect and designer, Emily Fischer, creates beautiful soft maps you can use, touch, and cuddle. When you consider that so many of the maps we look at and use these days are digitized, these Soft Maps—quilted queen, twin, and mini-maps of cities and neighborhoods—are an expressive and tactile reminder of place. They're beautiful and are meant to be used. (Fischer was inspired to create these maps as her mother lost her eye sight.) Haptic Lab's current locations include Brooklyn, Manhattan, Washington DC, Chicago, San Francisco and Los Angeles, but they welcome custom orders. Love the idea of wrapping myself in a map of west-Clare! Great gift. ($150—$800)
HapticLab.com

Native Vermont Originals

Okay, so technically this is not a map; it's a typography collage. BUT when you customize it with the names of the places that are important to you, it becomes a map of you. I really love the idea of a typography map that is not a physical drawing of a place but almost a trail of placenames. There are so many different ways you could go with this—you could customize to include the names of the thirty-two counties of Ireland and hello!—it's a map of Ireland, or you could make it even more unique and add the names of all the places you've ever lived, all the teams you have ever followed (for me it'd read, The Magpies, The Banner, The NY Yankees, The Brooklyn Shamrocks), or just important places to you. Love it.
NativeVermont.etsy.com