I noticed during my endless window-staring on the cursed 84x in to college this morning that a few of the shops I passed were closed. There weren’t that many, but seeing as it was about 10 o’clock on a Wednesday morning I was surprised to see any shops closed. You have to wonder why their proprietors chose not to open up this morning. Of course I didn’t wonder, because the reason was immediately apparent from the fact that all of these mysteriously-closed establishments were off-licences. Ash Wednesday. One of the (thankfully) few days left in this country when it becomes okay for the Catholic majority to opress the rest of us.
Last time I checked—which was, incidentally, just a few moments ago at the census website—over 11 percent of the population of Ireland was composed of non-Catholics. Maybe I should be thankful I’m still allowed to eat meat (note to Catholics: fish is meat).