ahoy, there! mateys! (arrghhh)

Today is International Talk Like a Pirate Day. Get out your red bandana and your eye patch. Put some gold chains around your neck. Grab some skulls and a hat. Wear some baggy pants that come down to your knees. (Warning: if you forget the eye patch you may be mistaken for a rapper or a DJ instead). But I say forget talking like a pirate. (I've never been great at that anyway, it comes out sounding more like an Irish brogue.) How about Be A Pirate Day? Today this sounds very appealing.

There are a few things that I have in common with pirates. I look good in hats. I like treasure chests full of sparkling jewels and gleaming gold coins. I don't have a dishwasher. Pirates of the Caribbean was always my favorite (the ride, not the movie).

But pirates have a few advantages over me. For example the cleanliness requirements for dishes are pretty low. There's probably not even a huge need for them as long as you get some food, the preparation of which is minimal, I'd imagine. Pirates don't have to deal with a kid who has decided that going to the bathroom in a toilet is overrated. In fact having an "accident" on the starboard side may happen on a fairly regular basis and is probably not a big deal. My guess is that pirate ships are pretty smelly already and some additional urine won't make a heck of a lot of difference.

Also, pirates don't feel guilty for spanking one child for chasing their sister around when that sister is holding scissors, which is the object they happen to be fighting over. This is because running on deck with sharp objects is expected and even encouraged. And if you trip and fall on the sharp object, well, man overboard! Besides, flogging and making someone walk the plank are a pirates' kind of discipline. Spanking? Probably more of a form of affection, like a stern talking to. Laundry rarely needs to be done because you only have maybe two sets of clothes and a dip in the ocean is as good as anything, and that happens whenever you tick off the captain. If you get concerned with the moral implications of being a pirate you can always call yourself a buccaneer and that makes everything okay. Well, alright. Maybe being a pirate is not all that it's cracked up to be.

The kicker on this gray day is this; as a pirate you get to sail to relaxing, sunny places like the Caribbean, or Puerto Rico or Hawaii or something. Today if you offered that to me, I might take you up on it.