Amuse your bar friends today with dese facts about St. Patrick (and his eponymous holiday) courtesy of National Geographic.

1.He wasn’t Irish. He was (gasp) a Brit.

2. He converted to Christianity.

3. He heard voices. Supernatural ones.

4. There are no snakes in Ireland, so he didn’t drive any into the sea with his mighty sceptre.

5. St. Paddy’s Day was basically invented by Irish Americans. It was a minor holiday in Ireland.

6. Irish soldiers fighting with the British in the U.S. Revolutionary War held the first St. Patrick’s Day parades.

7. On a normal day, 5.5 million pints of Guinness are imbibed. (Only a hundred or so by my uncles.)

8. On St. Patrick’s day, revelers down 13 million pints of Guinness.

9. In the United States, it’s customary to wear green on St. Patrick’s Day. But in Ireland the color was long considered to be unlucky.