The lilt of Irish slaughter?

Well, it's that day again.

If I had to guess, I'd say the Irish people have become the most popular immigrants we've ever had in America, and that's not just because they've got a day strongly associated with drinking that goes back to colonial times. Other cultures do just as much whoopin' it up and have more popular food, too. But one thing the Irish people and their US descendants have going for them is their sense of humor. 

At a time when everyone's looking to be angry at on behalf of their long-buried ancestors, do the Irish waste their time doing that? 

You'd better believe it. I know third- and fourth-generation Americans of only partial Irish descent who hate the English as if the English had collectively and personally insulted their mothers last week.

Can the Irish be belligerent? What makes you even ask? 

Look in some dictionaries under the word "belligerent" and you'll see a picture of Paddy throwing a roundhouse. If you're wearin' o' the orange in some places today, you might be wearin' o' the black eye tomorrow. 

But the Irish have a much-admired sense of humor. The Jewish people in America do as well, famous for it going back to the 19th century, but their humor carries more of the fatalism that centuries of pogroms will inspire. Irish jokes are usually intended to show how clever they are, how dumb others are, or just how silly people can be. And who has a problem with that? We're all doofuses sometimes. Even Chuck Norris, I'd wager, although no one has ever seen it. (And lived.) 

(Chuck's about half Irish, BTW.)

Let us give thanks today for the Irish, for managing to keep a sense of humor in this difficult old world. Life is hard whether you can laugh or not, but it's harder if you cannot.