It’s a GREAT time to be Irish.

Large1/03/2025 3:50 PM

Bonnie Cash. Shutterstock Images.

Inevitably some douchebag will comment “tHiS DiDn'T AgE WeLL” after Notre Dame loses to Penn State next week, but the reason I am writing this blog runs much deeper than any football game.

But let’s talk about that football game for just a sec… After “we” lost to Northern Illinois at home back in early September, I did two things:

I said to myself, “That ugly bastard, Chief, and his ‘In The Year of Our Lord…’ blog is a fucking jinx.
I wrote off this season as a failure… I would still watch every weekend, but my expectations were low because it was a home loss to a team whose mascot I cannot recall.

Fast forward 4 months and two playoff wins, and I just said to myself, “Man, that fucking handsome sonofabitch, Chief, with his meaty cock that probably tastes like a frappuccino, is a goddamned genius.”

I was a freshman at ND in 1989, the year after "our" last National Championship, and I’m not saying "we’re" about to win another… But I am saying it feels fucking great to give Indiana a dose of reality and then give Georgia a good old-fashioned horse-pounding.

The win will also bring out the same group of mouth-breathers who will now unavoidably complain about Notre Dame's strong "Subway Alumni" fan base because the community college they almost graduated from continues to wallow in obscurity.

LindaJoHeilman. Getty Images.

By their reasoning, the only people who now have the right to support a team in the playoffs are me, Big Ev, Matthew McConaughey, and Jerry Sandusky… A group that is almost a 'dream blunt rotation' if we could just ditch that McConaughey guy and his terrible tuna salad recipe.

Scott Coleman. Shutterstock Images.

That's it for football… So why else is it so great to be Irish?

I'll tell you why.

First off, with all the hustle and bustle of the holidays finally in the rearview, the Irish and Irish-adjacent are now in countdown mode for the easiest holiday to celebrate, and that holiday is St Patrick's Day, which is officially 74 days away.

If you need me on March 17th, I'll be here…

What else?

I "work" in New York City. A place that some consider the Culinary Capital of the World. And one of the hottest dishes the city has to offer right now was a staple for me growing up in a household run by a mom and dad who were raised in Dublin and Cork, respectively.

That dish is the soda bread scone at Mary O's in the East Village…

So go wait in line alongside dejected Georgia fans for a veal chop at whatever guinea place is Instagram-famous this week. I'll be enjoying a perfectly baked scone smothered in sweet-cream butter and homemade blackberry jam.

What else?… Do you like to get drunk and sing like no one is watching?

If the answer is yes, then find me a better tune than this to yell at the top of your lungs while your wife begs you to come home…

If you can't see how that is a PERFECT drinking song, then you can simply go fuck yourself.

What else?… How about Hollywood?

Well, when director Ridley Scott decided to make a sequel to one of the greatest movies of all time, he didn't go back to the pubs of New Zealand to find the next Russell Crowe. Instead, he tapped an Irish-born actor named Paul Mescal to helm the absolute disaster he called Gladiator II…

Giphy Images.

(Pascal vs Mescal)

But what about good acting performances?

The greatest actors of my generation WERE a filth limey named Daniel Day-Lewis, a very-dead Philip Seymour Hoffman, and some guy named Kevin Spacey who seems to have taken a hiatus, for some reason.

Those guys were THEN, and this handsome lad is NOW…

Jason Howard/Bauer-Griffin. Getty Images.

You can talk all you want about other "thespians" and their performances in art-house films that people pretend to enjoy, but the single-greatest actor alive right now is Colin Fucking Farrel, a proud son of Erin, and a dedicated family man.