Happy St. Gertrudes Day to all cats and cat-lovers!

Today is St. Patrick's day, but it's also the feast day of St. Gertrude,
patron saint of cats, cat lovers, gardeners, herbalists, spinners, the
mentally ill, recently dead people, pilgrims, and travellers searching
for lodging.

Gertrude is often depicted spinning yarn, holding a distaff, with a cat
near her. Alternately, she is represented as an abbess with mice at her
feet. She is patron of gardeners because fine weather on her feast day
meant it was time to begin spring planting: "Invoked as a patroness of
those who had recently died, who were popularly supposed to experience a
three-day journey to the next world; they spent the first night under
the care of Gertrude, and the second under Michael the Archangel."