Yup! It’s that time of year again! That one day out of the entire year when many blogs and websites alter their logos and verbage, and Tweets take on an entirely new voice. Yes, that’s it–September 19th–International Talk Like a Pirate day! (ITLAPD)
I first became aware of this fun, obscure holiday a few years ago when I noticed some of my regularly visited websites ‘speaking’ funny. I figured it had something to do with Johnny Depp’s Pirates of the Carribbean movies. Though that made perfect since, in my humble opinion, I soon discovered it had nothing to do with that.
This unbelievable holiday started in 1995 by John Baur (Ol’ Chumbucket) and Mark Summers (Cap’n Slappy), a pair of regular guys from of Albany, Oregon, U.S. As the story goes, they were playing racquetball and yelled in pirate ‘language’ to spurr each other onand encourage one another during their game.They enjoyed using pirate lingo so much that they decided to create a new holiday. Who knew that’s all it takes to make a new holiday?
After 7 long years of lone celebration of their holiday, until the year 2002 when their story was told by Dave Barry in a nationally syndicated newspaper. Television and radio interviews soon followed. Today, International Talk Like a Pirate Day has a pretty big following –View International Talk Like A Pirate Day 2011 map.
While the holiday’s originators advise against emulating the historically bad persona of real pirates, and emphasize that this is not what the holiday is about, they confess that there is no other point
of this day than to just have fun, because ‘talking like a pirate is fun!’
“Arrr!”, So what does one do to celebrate International Talk Like a Pirate Day? For starters, greet people you meet with “Ahoy, matey!” rather than just a simple “hello”. For other ideas, visit the Official Talk Like a Pirate Day website where you can find events taking place in celebration or even ideas for creating your own celebration. The Official Talk Like a Pirate Day website is a neat little site by the holiday’s originators, Mark “Cap’n Slappy” Summers, John “Ol’ Chumbucket” Baur. You can buy their book, t-shirts, party kits, etc. on their website.
There’s also other associated pirate links as well as games, how-to’s, newsletters, and other fun stuff to help you get in touch with your inner pirate, or at best, simply just dress in black and red!
Happy Talk Like a Pirate Day, everyone!