The wearin' o' the orange...

[jhetley]

And a happy St. Paddy's day to all o' ye fake-Irish out there.  While the lineage of our family name is Irish, we have reason for doubtin' it's Catholic.  Hence the subject line.  Probably elbow-deep in Cromwell's bloody deeds...

Besides, damn little green in view around here.  Even the back yard spruces look rather drab with dust and age.

Comments

[quilzas.livejournal.com]

I inadvertantly wore green today. If you consider olive drab green anyway. My one green piece of clothing, coats aside.

[sclerotic-rings.livejournal.com]

Thanks to my parentage (My father's Catholic, but he's Brit/Scot Catholic; my mother's Irish, but raised Lutheran), I get to alternate colors on odd versus even years. In fact, this year, I not only get to wear orange, but I get to show off one of my favorite critters (http://www.reptileshirts.com/alsnapper400.jpg) in the process.

[jhetley.livejournal.com]

Once I sorted out the scale, that looks rather like a snapping turtle...

[sclerotic-rings.livejournal.com]

Yep. The Czarina and I talk about buying a house with a pool, and then covering it with a greenhouse. This way I have a rain reservoir to take care of my plants over the summer, I have an extensive thermal mass, I have a shallow end to grow Victoria giant lilypads, and I have enough room to keep at least one alligator snapping turtle. Most people look at me strangely, but I've had nothing but wonderful experiences with common and alligator snapping turtles, and I'd like to do my best to get involved with a breeding program so as to prevent them from becoming extinct.

[jhetley.livejournal.com]

Well, you'd need to add a bank of sand and gravel if you want the breeding program. Also, don't add any raccoons or skunks to the ecosystem...

[sclerotic-rings.livejournal.com]

That's why I build the greenhouse over the whole schmeal. Besides, and I speak from experience, the best thing to do when your mama alligator snapper moves up on land to lay her eggs (and it's one hell of an experience, especially with one the size of an 18-wheeler tire) is wait until she digs her hole and then pull the eggs out one by one and put them in an incubator. This way, they have more than a fair chance of survival.

[jhetley.livejournal.com]

We don't get the "Abrams" version of snapper up here, but I remember them from my youth in Georgia. Tasty...

According to Wife, the main threats to our local snapper population are nest-predators and cars. Not much vogue for turtle soup in chowder territory.

[wcg.livejournal.com]

Happy St. Patrick's day Jim. Remember, Cromwell came down hard on the Ulster Scots-Irish too, since they were Presbyterian dissenters. He killed over 100,000 of them, as well as 500,000 Catholic Irish, in the interest of pure puritanism.

[jhetley.livejournal.com]

Well, the English form of the family name comes from further south. But I was jesting with the Cromwell reference -- we get a mention in Pepys tied to the return of Charley Stuart II...