How to safely celebrate the Green during Orange

[guest]

“The best luck of all is the luck you make for yourself.” While it sounds like a traditional Irish saying, it’s the words of General Douglas MacArthur. Nonetheless, it’s a reminder that it’s not luck that will help protect you from COVID-19 this St. Paddy’s Day - it’s about what COVID preventative actions you take and practice.

Here are some helpful tips for safe ways to celebrate the Green this year, as well as some ways to share the green with our local businesses too.

Celebrating St. Paddy’s in the comforts of home

The old Irish saying, “May your home always be too small to hold all of your friends,” can be expanded to limit your at-home St. Paddy’s social to people within your own household. While vaccines keep rolling in, we need to keep our chins, spirits and safety protocols up. We have come too far to let the virus catch us now.

But you can still don your green apparel, hats and say, “Hey Siri, Alexa, Google, play some St. Patrick’s Day music.”

While your home may be too small for all your friends, you can fit all of them in your online chats. You can share your stories and a raise a glass for a toast – virtually. It’s the next best thing to being there.

If it’s a mild spring day and you want to socialize outdoors, remember the limit is 25 people and you must keep two metres from people outside your household. Wear a mask to give you and everyone extra protection.

Take out and delivery – share the green with local businesses

And when you celebrate the Green at home, be sure to spread some green and luck to our local businesses. Order take out at local establishments who feature Irish and pub fare and beverages, as well as local breweries for delivery and pickup. If pub or Irish fare is not your taste, order from your favourite establishment – whether it’s spaghetti, pizza, curry chicken, or shawarmas. Anything goes.

Pubs and food establishments

If you choose to visit your favourite establishment, be diligent in making your own luck by remaining COVID Wise. Your shirt or button may say, “Kiss me, I’m Irish.” But keep the luck on your side by saying, stand back two metres, please. The luckiest thing you can wear is a mask.

Under the Province of Ontario’s Orange status, pubs and restaurants can have a maximum of 50 people indoors – depending on the size of the establishment. You can only have four per table and each table must be separated by two metres from surrounding tables.

It’s strongly recommended to share that table with people from your own household. People must maintain physical distancing from others in the restaurant.

If you choose to visit your favourite restaurant and pub, be sure to wear a mask when you’re not sipping your favourite beverage, having a bite to eat, or anytime when you get up and leave the table.

Music can be played at the pub, with certain restrictions, which include physical distancing between musicians, use of plexiglass and reduced volume.

The sale of alcohol must stop at 9 pm and the pub or restaurant dining must close by 10 pm.

Better days ahead

While another St. Patrick’s Day has been impacted by COVID-19, the difference this year is that we can now see the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. More and more residents are being vaccinated each day. Each month will see more and more people get their turn. Be sure to keep yourself in tune with the latest vaccination updates on ottawa.ca/covid-19 and ottawapublichealth.ca. Next year, we hope to return to our regular celebration of the Green!

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