Special Guest Blogger: Saint Columbanus

I was never much of a people person, i was much more at home communicating with animals and the more dangerous the better but in Ireland the most dangerous thing we had was a badger after Saint Patrick had driven all the snakes out so i bopped around Ireland for a few decades and decided to try my hand in Europe so got permission to travel to the continent.
I made a home in the forests of Gaul and my Irish version of Catholicism was pretty well received and the community expanded and drew more pilgrims, so i would often disappear for weeks on to avoid the crowds to a cave miles away with a messenger who would run between me and the commnunity.
Just me, an out of puff messenger and the lovely cute animals but over time my influence grew and the Frankish bishops didn't like that my version of Catholicism was ever-so slightly different to theirs, mostly the dates of Easter as they used a different calendar to us Irish folk and they also objected to my haircut. Seriously, they complained about my hair style which was shaved at the top and a thin ring of hair going around the head.
The King sent soldiers to drive me back to Ireland but i managed to escape and went on a Europe wide tour across France, Austria and into Lombard, Italy where i was given a secluded tract of land in the Mountain forests and set about converting the people of Northern Italy and spending time with the animals.
I would roam the forests with birds flying around my head and landing on my shoulders while squirrels would run up and down my robes and nest in my cowl but i wasn't some sort of hippie because my control over animals didn't stop with the adorable ones.
While walking through the forest one day, i was confronted by a dozen hungry wolves, probably attracted by all the tasty birds and squirrels that followed me around everywhere to be fair, but they laid down and allowed me and my menagerie to pass unharmed.
Another time i went to a cave for a bit of a lay down but it already had a resident, a whacking great hibernating bear but it was a very nice cave so i woke it up and ordered it to leave the cave which it did. After seeing what it had left in the corner i wish i had also told it from now, do your business in the woods buster.
I later came across another bear, might have been the same one, they all look the same to me, which was feasting on the carcass of a deer so deciding that i had got enough picking pine needles out of my feet, nicely asked the bear not to harm the skin of the deer so that i could use it to make a new pair of shoes.
My final bear interaction was to tie a plow to one and get it to plow the monasteries fields so you would assume that when i died later i would be the Saint of bears or animals or even embarrassing haircuts (the mullet, come on, your telling me that's not worth asking for help to sort out) but they put me in charge of hearing the prayers made by motorcyclists due to my traveling although i am depicted in most stained glass windows as palling around with a bear and not some leather clad greaser on a Harley Davidson.