As Kermit once said, “It ain’t easy bein green.” But Kermit obviously hadn’t experienced St. Patrick’s Day. If he had, he might know that being green ain’t such a bad thing.

For those of us who don’t know what this holiday is actually celebrating, here is what we do know:
1. Get wasted.
2. Wear green.

You can figure out number one on your own, but here’s a little help with number two (tee hee, number two). Below, our favorite St. Patrick’s Day attire, with just enough time to put in your order before the big day:

Now just load up on the Jameson and green beer and you’re good to go for the holiest of holy college holidays.

You shower and dress yourself in your cutest green outfit (that you laid out last night) before heading out with the roommates to get in line for Kegs & Eggs (and a free t-shirt!) at one of the campus Pubs.

By the time 8am rolls around, you are chugging an Irish Car Bomb. By 8:30, your tongue is a bright shade of green, which you show off in the 26 selfies you take with your roommate.

The scene at the first bar gets old after awhile, so you grab your friends and move on. You stumble down the street en route to a house party giving a “Woohoo!” and high five/hug to every other St. Patrick’s Day celebrator on the street. You stop and heckle that kid who is clearly going to class. “What is wrong with you?! It’s OUR holiday!!”  You run into someone dressed as a Leprechaun and make him take a picture with you. (And think to yourself, “I’ll just tag him as Random Leprechaun Dude.”)

When you finally make your way to the party, you immediately hop on a team for green flip cup. Another Leprechaun Dude fills the cups with beer, but it looks different than the stuff you had at the bar. You soon find out that green beer is expensive, so these guys made it themselves by mixing food coloring into the cups/pitchers.

Three rounds later, not only is your tongue a nice shade of green, but your lips and chin as well from all that chugging. You take 14 more selfies with your flip cup team, which you have now dubbed “The Green Bearded Ladies.”

It is now 1pm and you are wasted. “KISS ME, I’M IRISHHH!” you scream at anyone who will listen. One drunk dude does (yes, even with your green beard), but closing your eyes makes you want to hurl so you pull away.

Another group of friends calls. They are at a bar. With food. You decide to head over there.

6 hours and a small pizza later (which you only know about because there is a pizza box in your bed and marinara sauce in your hair), you wake up fully clothed. With your shoes on.  The last thing you remember was an order of cheese fries and a green long island iced tea.

Your cell phone is in your hand, yet somehow you missed 11 calls and 22 text messages. You get up and look in the mirror. Your chin is green, your hands are covered in bar stamps and the shirt you are wearing is not yours.

Besides the cotton mouth, though, you feel pretty good. Your phone buzzes again – a text message. “Where you be, biznaaaatch? Come to the bar!”

You run your fingers through your hair, grab the final piece of pizza out of the box, and head out for St. Patrick’s Day Round 2.

Yeah, we’ve all been there. And it truly is the greatest day of the year.

[Photo courtesy of The Orion]

From all of us at CollegeCandy, have a lovely/rockin’ St. Patty’s Day! Just don’t forget the rules.

Kids have Christmas. Lovers have Valentine’s Day. Presidents have President’s day. What do we, the college students of the world, have?

St. Patrick’s day! Woooohooo!!

Only 4 more days until our favorite holiday of the year! Friends! Drinking Games! Kegs and eggs! A full day of debauchery! (Note: different from normal college weekends by the addition of green clothing.) The combination of costumes, Irish music, bar specials and friends makes this the best day of the year. And we won’t let anyone or anything take it away from us.

The CollegeCandy writers weighed in this week on their worst St. Patrick’s day nightmares, real or imagined. We tried to have them tell us their favorite memories, but most people can’t remember St. Patty’s Days of the past for some reason. Weird.

Cristina – Michigan State University: An exam, a paper, and getting caught in the rain with my Uggs (oh it’s happened before).

Lauren – University of Michigan: That one year I had to give a presentation. At 4pm. Too bad the DQ Blizzard and bottle of Powerade I got on the way to class did nothing to combat the 4 Irish Car Bombs I’d had….for breakfast.

Brithny – Duke : One time my friend tried to dye her hair with green jello. She went a little overboard, and accidently turned her forehead and ears green too! Looking like a leprechaun… definitely a nightmare.

Sara C – Fordham: Last year on St. Patrick’s Day I was in Israel, where none of the bartenders I encountered had ever heard of the holiday, much less had any green beer on tap. For real.

Charlsie – Hollins: I hooked up with an Irish Exchange student whom I thought had blonde hair and blue eyes, but he looked quite different as the alcohol wore off. Ugh.

Kiki – University of Missouri: I went to a Catholic high school, plaid skirts and everything, and freshman year I thought it would be really cute to wear my forest green polo shirt with shamrock print knee socks from Target’s dollar section. Not a good look for anyone.

K – GWU: Does the morning after St. Patty’s day festivities count? Throwing up all morning…at work…was probably the worst 6 hours of my entire life. Not sure how I still have that job!

Elizabeth – UC Berkeley: Two years ago, my Mom called me on St. Patrick’s Day to tell me that my dog was dying.  I was definitelyyyy plastered and making a scene in the middle of a beer pong tournament…

Alex- Lakehead: I’ve never experienced anything embarassing (by some miracle), but last year we had to call my friend’s ex-boyfriend to pick us up and she ended up puking blueberry vodka all over his car’s interior. You really can’t even imagine what it smells like until you’ve experienced it first hand. But at least we had cute outfits!

Noa – CU Boulder: I spent 45 minutes flirting with a guy last year on St. Pats. I thought it was going well until I went to the bathroom and discovered my kelly green teeth. They were neon! I came back and the guy was gone. Awesome.

Sarabeth – University of Texas: I’m from an Irish family and forgot to wear green one year. They take the pinching thing a bit too far.

S.E. – Fordham: My worst St. Patty’s Day nightmare would be having an exam the day after. Everyone knows you need to drink on St. Patty’s Day, but it’s just so hard to do this if you’re worrying about a test. WTF, school!?

So, to assist you in your 14+ hour drinking binge, this playlist features some of the best music the Emerald Isle has to offer (and alright, not all the artists are Irish – but they’re still fun to listen to while guzzling green beer, ya dig?).

I think it’s no coincidence that all these Irish tracks are also PERFECT springtime-is-almost-kinda-sorta-here-so-let’s-get-drunk-on-the-porch songs. That means even if you can’t skip class to hit the bar (and/or porch) early in the mornin’, you can save it for the next sunny day you have to waste away getting wasted.

How bout gettin’ yer drink on here, aye?

But what is St. Patrick’s Day without green beverages? Will I be forced to drink average colored beer if I nix the food coloring? Or worse yet, will I get my “Irish and Proud” t-shirt revoked?

Well I’ve got news for whoever wants to go up against this Irish lush – I will not be taken down without a fight! Not while there are plenty of other delicious green concoctions floating around, anyway. So don’t panic, I have some St. Patrick’s day drinks that are just as fun and twice as effective.

The classic Appletini (which I have renamed Apple O’Tini for the sake of St. Patrick’s Day)

1.5 oz of Smirnoff Green Apple Twist Vodka

1 oz DeKuyper Sour Apple Pucker Schnapps

Erin Go Margarita

1.5 oz of Tequila

.5 oz of Triple sec

1 oz Lime juice

Kiss Me I’m Irish (and drunk)

1 oz Midori Melon Liqueur

1 oz Whiskey sour mix

2 oz Sprite

Shamrock Shooter (aka Kamikazee Jello Shots)

1 (6 oz) Package of lime Jello

10 oz Citrus vodka

4 oz Blue Curacao

2 oz Lime Juice

Dissolve Jello in boiling water and add alcohol

Get Lucky Punch

2 (12 oz) cans frozen limeade concentrate

2 (12 oz) cans frozen lemonade concentrate

2 (2 liter) bottles lemon-lime flavored carbonated soda

1 (750 milliliter) bottle rum

2 quarts lime sherbet

St. Patty’s Day is just around the corner, people! What does that mean? Well, green teeth, for one. But it also means it’s time to break out all that green wear so you don’t get pinched by a bunch of drunk Irish people. But getting festive doesn’t mean you have to give up looking cute.

Au contraire! I’ve scouted the web to find some mighty cute St. Patty’s day options. So cute, in fact, that you can wear them all year round. Leave the Leprechan hat at home this year. Whether you are up for Kegs and Eggs at 4am, or playing (green) beer pong long into the night, this St. Pat’s day you are going to do it in style.

If you’re gonna do the Irish pub or bar crawl thing, you can go casual with a simple cotton top or feminine cardigan and a cute pair of jeans…

If you’re hittin’ up the club for a night out, you’ll need a sassy and sexy top, like any of these…

For you lucky ducks who live in warmer weather climates and will be celebrating the day in some nice spring sunshine, here are some lighter options…

And if you’re just lookin’ for a hint of green, accessories and shoes are the way to do it. I mean, come on, how cute is this stuff?!

Now it’s time to get out there and see if the luck o’ the Irish really works.

St. Pat’s is the holiday that has never been sugar-coated with false meaning or wholly commercialized by Hallmark (sure greeting cards exist, but who really gives them?).  So make sure you embrace your inner Irish and do it up right on March 17.

1.  The Booze.

To throw a full-on Irish bash, you have to have an appropriate alcohol selection.  Well, what do you know? GoIreland.com happens to have a handy list of the most popular libations of the Emerald Isle, in case you’ve never heard of Jameson or Guinness.

Make sure you bar is stocked with whiskey, irish cream, and the beer they call “a meal in a can,” but don’t neglect some other favorites.  Other popular beers include Murphy’s Stout, Kilkenny, and Smithwick’s.  Cider is also a favorite.  If you’re a perfectionist, you might try to get your hands on some Meade or Poitín.

But perhaps I’m getting ahead of myself.  We are college students after all – mix up some Green Appletinis and make a few trays of lime Jell-O shots, and you won’t hear any complaints.  Really want some green magic to happen? Try to get your hands on the ultimate green liquor, absinthe, and let the green fairy fly.

2.  The Music.

Dropkick Murphy’s are always a good choice.  U2, the Cranberries, Flogging Molly, or Thin Lizzy will also get people into the Irish spirit.  Once the Jameson lowers your guests’ inhibitions, you may want to throw on some Irish Step tunes and see who clears enough space to perform what they call a “Riverdance” routine.

Oh, but don’t neglect the ever-popular Irish drinking songs.  CelticMP3s.com offers a variety of websites and downloads to browse, but you can also order The Holy Grail of Irish Drinking Songs from Amazon.  Or, ya know, just search for “Finnegan’s Wake” on iTunes.

3.  The Food

Corned beef and cabbage or baked potatoes! On second thought… maybe take the Americanized St. Pat’s route here and put out chips with guacamole and green cupcakes or something.

4.  The Games

Make up silly drunken limericks.  Place everyone’s name in a hat, and pass it around.  Make everyone try to make a limerick out of the name of the person whose name they chose.  It might be hard for names like Elizabeth, but anyone who’s seen a particular Seinfeld ep will be oh-so-glad they invited Dolores to the party.

If you can’t get everyone to focus long enough to be creative and rhyme stuff, play Irish Quarters. Basically, you spin a quarter and then chug beer until the quarter stops.  There are no winners in this game. And we all lose the next morning.

For all the heavyweights in the room, take the Irish Roulette challenge. Everyone lines up a shot and rolls a dice.  The lowest number drinks.  In the event of a “tie,” it’s a social. Be careful with this one, friends.

5.  The Decorations

Um, are you kidding me? Green everywhere.  Shamrocks too, and maybe a pot of gold if you really want to go all out.

Be creative this St. Patrick’s Day.  Think of all the festive ways you can celebrate, because after this holiday, what do we have? Easter? That’s the last holiday to succumb to serving as an excuse for collegiate binge-drinking.  Besides, it’s the only day of the year you can use the pick-up lines, “Kiss Me, I’m Irish” (whether you really are, of course is a different story), “Show me your shamrocks!” or, “Hey, are you a leprechaun? Because you make me want to get lucky.” Okay, no, maybe not.

But seriously folks, do stay safe on this holiday, as with every other.

The Irish have a saying: An Irish man is never drunk, as long as he can hold onto one blade of grass and fall off the face of the earth.

I don’t care if you just flew in from Dublin.  Your tolerance is NOT that high.

Last summer, I thought I was invincible when it came to the sun. My friends can get tan with SPF 4 or 8, so why couldn’t I? On two various occasions, I felt the effects of not listening to the realistic side of my brain in terms of summer sunshine. I spent a week in June in San Antonio, Texas, where it was roughly 95 degrees every day. As this was a more family-oriented – go out to dinner, do family related things – sunbathing took a back seat, until the last dreaded day, when I thought it was appropriate to lay at the pool, for three solid hours, with nothing – and I mean, not a drop of sunscreen – on my body.

After a few hours, I ran to the bathroom, out of the sunlight, and got a load of myself: completely toasted, head to toe (Did I mention I didn’t flip over, so my back side was ghost white and my front side was cherry red?). The plane ride home was torture, even in a tshirt and spandex pants I was in excrutiating pain, had the shakes and was nauscous – not to mention, my body was giving off enough heat that people started calling me a human radiator. I got home and proceeded to cry and lie on the tile in my bathroom, naked, until I passed out covered in Aloe.

The following day, I thought it was appropriate – after being in Texas and gorging for a solid week – to get on my treadmill and go for a run. No sooner did I break the first mile that I looked down at my stomach and noticed the sunburn had swelled into tiny blisters all over my body, which – once they died down – peeled and turned my skin into a lovely purple color, for two solid weeks. Lesson learned: Wear sunscreen at all times.

A few months later, after telling myself I had learned my lesson, flew to my house in South Carolina for a week, where I proceeded to use 15 SPF instead of 45 SPF like my white behind should’ve. I wound up with a heat rash that landed me in the Emergency Walk-In Clinic and, after a shot of cortisone steroids in my rear end, antibiotics and another round of steroids, I landed myself on my couch, watching trashy television, while everyone else got to play in the pool. Lesson learned: Wear the RIGHT type of sunblock for your skin.

Despite the intense pain sunburn brings, there are long-term repercussions for not taking care of your skin in the warm weather, aka skin cancer. So, lather up in the right stuff and enjoy catching those rays in a healthy way, otherwise, you could wind up lying on the bathroom floor like me.

I get looks a lot. That shouldn’t really strike me as surprising; everyone gets looks. Amused looks, horrified looks, heartbroken looks, enamored looks…I’ve gotten them all. Still, nothing was quite the punch in the gut as the look my mother gave me when I told her I was going out with a girl.

I’d been dating Megan for something like six months around the time I finally talked to my mom. For six months, I was horrified at the concept of telling my middle-aged, old-fashioned African-American mother that her daughter, the girl she had been a father and mother to for twenty years, was very much in love with your typical Irish girl (sans fiery-red Weasley hair).

I had told my mother that I was bi before, but it was some six years ago and I’m pretty sure that she just passed it off as me being dazed after being hit over the head with puberty. I was almost certain that she’d forgotten (she hadn’t, the old elephant), and when I told her, a look of terror and disgust would follow suit.

It didn’t, and I still can’t decide if I’m grateful for that or not.

It was a little after Christmas when I finally decided I was going to fess up. Megan had just had surgery on her knee, and I wanted to be there for her (read: be her slave for a week). I had told my mother a half-baked excuse as to why I was hoping on a Greyhound and going from Long Island to Virginia to see one of my “friends” from school. After a lot of thought, I decided to just lay it all out.

At first, her expression was the sort of quiet, understanding, thoughtful expression that moms usually have when you’re pouring your heart out to them. I explained in slow, carefully chosen words that I had been in a relationship with Megan for a few months, and that I felt like it was time to tell her such. There was a five second silence that stood between my voice and hers.

“I don’t want you to make decisions based on a few negative experiences,” she finally replied. I hastily explained that, no, it wasn’t because of the horrible ex-boyfriend fiasco (we were never actually going out). She nodded, and I could tell that it was forced. She wasn’t upset or horrified, but I could tell, I could see that she was disappointed, and that hurt me more than if she had thrown me out the house. Here was my mother, a black woman that grew up in Brooklyn during the Civil Rights movement, who was barely a generation removed from Barbados and had been instilled with good, honest West Indian values, and she was disappointed.

“I figured it out already,” she added after a few seconds with a forced smile. I had a feeling she did, and I coughed out a chuckle as a reply. Megan had come to visit me that summer, before she had even asked me out. My mother can be and often is intimidating, so Megan spent most of her time upstairs in my room. (“Megan can sleep in the guest room, if she wants,” my mother helpfully suggested on Megan’s second night with us. “I know,” I sheepishly replied. I think that was when she figured it out.) We were silly and flirty the entire time, but it wasn’t really until she got on the Amtrak back to Virginia that I realized that I was lovesick.

After a few more awkward exchanges (“Does she only like girls, or is she…?” “No, no, she’s…she’s like me, too.” “Just be open to…” “I will.”), I scurried back to the security of my room. The next day, it seemed like nothing had really changed. She didn’t treat me any differently, and it seemed like she had forgotten the conversation entirely. Maybe she had.

My mother occasionally asks how Megan is when I talk to her on the phone, but not often. I’ve come to realize that there will always be a part of her that is disappointed in me, and that realization sleeps in my gut, coming out of hibernation every now and then to pace around and growl at me. In time, I hope that she’ll accept the fact that, yes, I do love this girl. But for now, knowing that my mom still loves me is good enough.