Arrr Mateys! Ahoy there!... and such

September 19th is not just the day before I finally get my hair cut. Today is International Talk Like a Pirate Day. You read that right. Nerds who desperately want a pirate's life of scurvy, and sailing from flea infested harbour to herpes infested wench now have their own magical day. So there you go. What's next? Smurf Appreciation Week? Ninja Day? According to Wikipedia, Ninja Day already exists. It’s creators were inspired by ITLAPD. And that, my friends, is why the internet will truly be the death of us all.

Making fun of people who love pirates is like picking on people who think they are vampires. At first it's easy to ridicule these outcasts with their strange talking, dressing, rum/blood drinking habits. Soon, however, you begin to feel bad because you realize how close you are to your prey. We are all part of the greater nerd hierarchy and we all have a place. One nerd's sword collection is another nerd's goth poetry. Can't we all be socially awkward together?

So instead of taunts, today I am offering an olive branch and snappy eye patch to pirates everywhere. I'm going to talk like a pirate - at least at home with my cat. In fact, I'm renaming Oscar "Ye Old Scurvy Land Rat" until tomorrow. Pirates are pretty cool, at least the movie ones that wear outrageous hats and spend pieces of eight. Also, the people who created this day were featured in a truly awesome episode of Wife Swap (your new husband thinks he's a pirate! Good luck getting him to pay the phone bill!). In celebration of... ugh... pirattitude...I offer my favourite pirate things. Enjoy them with loved ones. Unless your loved ones are normal people. Then ditch that boring family, because it's pirate day matey!

Cassandra’s List of Pirate Treasures! (get it?!)
1 - Parrots on your shoulder! Did the birds poop on the pirates? Did the pirates even care?

2 - The pirate simulation game Tropico 2. A friend gave it to me based on a brief conversation and a general feeling that I would like to spend hours pretending I'm a pirate. He was right! I love this game.

3 - The sailor / pirate on Family Guy who has two peg legs and two peg arms. That guy is hard core.

4 - The Styrofoam pirate hat my pal Stephanie made during dinner one night at our University cafeteria. It was an inverted soup bowl with a skull drawn on it. She’s no Martha Stewart but that hat was the cat's meow. Or the pirate’s' wench.

5 - Three words: Captain Freaking Blood. Oh my God. Errol Flynn IS Captain Blood. The original posters proclaimed "6 feet 4 of fighting manhood!", and they were so SO right. This is the best pirate movie ever. It has horrible French accents, sword fights, booty, and just a dash of slavery.

Captain Blood is good, but Captain Levasseur is OUTRAGEOUSLY French!
6 - The band Ghost Pirates Without Heads. That name totally says "I wear horn rimmed glasses and Green Latern tee-shirts ironically. Here's a song I wrote about watching TV, which I also do ironically."

7 - The trailers for the Pirates of the Caribbean movies that just said "PIRATES!" over and over again until I had to laugh and clap my hands like a happy monkey.

8 - Pirate monkeys... Okay, now I'm just doing word association.

Enjoy this stupid day nerds! Arrr!