Hallowed Ween

Halloween often confuses us, as many people often dress up as pirates without obtaining the proper zoning clearances and filling out form Q7 ( a temporary Piracy License). So, often will see an apparent pirate waltzing down the street, and will flash the secret pirate hand signal at them, and they'll stare at us blankly, (which insults our pirately honor) so we'll be forced to challenge them to a sword fight, and they'll start crying, and their mothers will yell at us.

Still, we do love halloween! We always sell alot of pirate cookie chonks (the individually wrapped cookiettes) that people give out to trick or treaters, Lester loves carving punkins (he uses a spoon so as not to hurt the punkin) YoHoJoe & NoEyesJohnson always egg the Vikings house with genuine squid eggs, and of course, we all like to not dress as pirates for a day. Don't get me wrong, we love being pirates, but wearing the exact same clothes for an entire year does get a bid tedious, not to mention smelly (we always do our laundry on halloween too.)

This year, the captain's going as horatio hornblower

I'm dressing up as the ghost of christmas presents

YoHo Joe's going as a grahampire (it's some inside joke that none of the rest of us get)

Lester's going as a pheasant (It's a bird thing)

and we all conviced NoEyes Johnson to go a bunny rabbit. He looks so funny! He keeps wondering why we all giggle near him.

Anyone going as a pirate for halloween this year, please send in your photos, and we'll post em! (don't worry, we won't tell anyone you didn't fillout form Q7)

doublificationary NO!

It seems the last post was posted in a twicish fasion. NO! Everyone refrain from double postaging again, or you will be rectified to within an inch of your life! I bet it was all the vikings fault. Lousy vikings.

Now, leave me alone.

Yargventures Episode Two: Resorting to cannibalism after being stranded only twenty minutes

Click image to enlarge

A Day in the Life of Me

5:18 Extremely loud noise startles me awake. Grab Slashy (my sword) and look around in panic. Realize for umpteenth time is alarm clock playing 'The 1812 Overture' at top volume. Double check that alarm is set for 8:15, my preference. Yep. Brief fantasy about smashing clock into millions of pieces. Remembering got it as christmas present, but not sure who from, so can't because what if they come by and get their feelings hurt, and I won't even know?

5:20 go jogging with pet Norwegish Elkhound Flompy. Flompy is extremely slow, but fortunately, I'm not feeling very excercisey.

6:00 Breakfast, Shrimpeeos cereal (free fishook inside! Now with 20% more barnacles!)

6:30 Fencing practice with imaginary enemies. Today, robot ninjas.

8:42 wear false moustache to buy coffee at the Bibucks, so the vikings won't recognize me. They make a good vikuccio.

9:00 open clock repair store. I am an expert clock repairman, so my morning-alarm-clock-debacle is a source of constant shame. # of customers: 2: A woman and her 2 kids (obviously tourists)looking for a souvenir, to whom I explained that Pellmellia is not renound for it's clocks, that I only repair them, and maybe he should visit switzerland; Other one is my best customer, Mr. Strange Man (I don't know his real name) who comes in every day, and buys 3 cheap green wristwatches, and a piece of the grandfather clock he's buying on the installment plan. No one knows why.

12:30 Peg Leg Pete brings lunch. Today, Pirate Fajitas, which consists of salted pork wrapped in hard tack. Pete chats about his spoon collection while I chew and nod.

2:00 daydreaming about good names for a band I have no interest in starting. What do you think about 'The Squirelltones?' or 'Groovking and the groovettes?'

3:00 more imaginary fencing. Gotta keep in top form for the piratelympics coming up. Accidentally smash 3 shelves worth of clocks.

3:04 Repair clocks

3:00 order more glue from glue depository. Have patiently expalined to me that I should buy in bulk, and explain back that I only need 4.2 oz and the moment, thanks for your concern.

4:17 make a note of all the serial numbers of the bills in my wallet, to make sure.

5:00 close shop

5:05 Dinner with crew at Screaming Virginia's Cafe. Pizza. Ancovies with green bits and whitish-yellow bits. I don't finish my plate, so Virginia won't let me have any dessert.

6:15 Go out to a movie 'The Parrots of Penzance' Great dance numbers, and the scene with the lobsters made me cry a little. Fortunately, I wear sunglasses even in dark movie theaters.

9:37 Midnight bicycle ride of doom (I know it's not technically midnight, and there was hardly any doom involved, but...)

10:14 home, (apartment) brush, (teeth) bed, (go to)

10:47 Unconsciousness

Joke / Wishfull thinking

A pirate, a ninja, and a viking walk into a bar. The Pirate says to the barkeep "I'll have a gallon of grog and a ration of rum." The ninja says "I will have a warm saké, served with honor" and the Viking says "I'll have a milk. With cimanin sprinkles, because I'm an idiot." So, the pirate chops his beard off, the ninja throws ninja-throwing things at him, and sics Godzilla on him, and the bar-patrons chase him outside, and tar and feather him, and pass a law banning all vikings, and set his boat on fire. Then they all live happily ever after. The end.

Yargventures Episode 1: Rationing.

Hello.

Um -- it seems we inadvertantly signed away the rights to do a series of comic strips about us to some cartoonist guy named Ray Friesen. We tried to sue him, but he said we signed away the right to do that too. We wouldn't dream of running his cartoons on our site, but he said we signed to do that too. I don't when we were doing all this signing, (we hardly ever sign things, because all pirates beleive that if something with your name on it sells on eBay, you lose your soul.) but obviously we weren't paying much attention. It must have been during that awards dinner. They said we were nominated for 'most piratelyness', we turned up in our best tuxedos and swimsuits, and there was hardly anybody there. Then, I don't remember much, and then it was the next day, and we all had headaches.

Anywhoo, here's the first in a series of cartoons.
(You can click to enlarge)

Misc and laneous Stuff/Things

Hiya! First things first, dyou like the new pavatar? (That's Pirate Avatar of course. Avatar means 'web logo image thing' or, more literally, 'the descent of a deity to the earth in an incarnate form or some manifest shape; the incarnation of a god.' Pirate of course means 'swashbuckley guy' not to be confused with 'the descent of a deity to the earth in an incarnate form or some manifest shape; the incarnation of a god. ' Pirates ever only did that once.

Second things second:

ummm...

I don't have much to talk about today.

Ooh! I can do this really cool magic trick! Watch!

---------

Didya see that! It looked like my arm really detatched, didn't it!?

Wait, you probably couldn't see my trick, huh? Lousy internet connection. It was REALLY cool though. I mean like, Houdini cool.

So, anybody got any interesting tatoos?
Don't show me!
I was just making conversation.

Anyone else here from Pellmellia? Raise your hands! one, two, three, okay none...

I'd like to give a shout out to my pal Lester. Hi Lester! I got those income tax receipts you asked for. What did you say you were making out of paper maché? I hope it's not another narwale.

Oh! I know what to talk about. My spoon collection! I have nearly 7.

I just got a really cool new spoon. It's 6 foot long, carved from the rare borarobnob tree by a blind Boomerangatangian woodsmith. It was originally used for hand to hand combat, and also formal dinners and Hollywood film premieres. It features a motif of inlaid ivory, depicting the famed Boomerangatang Flinging Sheep. They guy said it's mysticky energy repulses the Evil Bognogs of Wagilmalayoo, but I don't really know what those are. If anyone has any information about the Evil Bognog of Wagilmalayoo, please send it to me immediately.

Pirates & Ninjas & Vikings, oh my!

Most people think that Pirates & Ninjas don't get along, and that is not true. We don't like ninjas of course, but that's just becuase we don't like anybody.

What pirates really hate, is Vikings. Think about it, #1, we both sail around in boats, #2 we both releive people of their valuables, #3 we both dress in hats and moustaches, and #4, there is no 4th thing. So as you can see we're rival clans, like the Hatfields & Mcfloyds, or the Montigues & Capulets (Doth thou prick your thumbeth at yonder me? Well, doth thou?!?) Actually, we're more like business competitors. Yeah. Like McLarrys and Burger Queeng, or Microsoft and Macintosh (Wait, this metaphor is confusing. Are pirates like Microsoft because we have a higher market share, or Macintosh, becuase they're intrinsically better?)

They following is a list of derogs (short for derogitory. It's a word now. I wordified it.) you can use, if you see a viking:

Insulting Names:
"Spam-Eater"
"Haddock-Head"
"Brandon"
and good ole 'Lousy/Ruddy Viking"

Insulting Comments
Nice Halloween Costume!
You raid, pillage and plunger! (helps if you brandish a plunger)
Call that a helmet!? I thought you were a giant rabbit!
If Viking do it, you can do it (marginally funny)

How to tell if someone is a viking:
The easiest way, is to look at their car. The hood ornament will be a 6 foot long dragon, there will be oars shoved out the passenger windows, and the bumpersticker will say something like 'I brake for narwales.' Vikings often wear 'I discovered the new world hundreds of years before Columbus and all I got was this lousy Tshirt' tshirts, and they think 'Hagar the Horrible' is funny.

Vikings are not to be confused with anyone from Norway, Finland, Scandanavia, Finland, Belgium, Oslo, Finland, that whole part of the world, or Finland, who are fine in our book (well, as fine as you can get with pirates, which as I said, is just plain regular dislike.) Yes, we do have a book. ISBN 0972817794.

I would like to take this opportunity to apologize to any Ninja a Pirate may have inadvertantly insulted over the years. We're working on new 'Ninja Cookies', and would really like some of you on our side to help on the promotional campaign, and to sell them door to door.

Skully

I've received many, many (3 1/2) emails, telegrams, communiques and threats scrawled in blood/ketchup about our logo. That's the skull we use a bunch. Lester named it Skully. No, it is not named after the character from the X Files, so quit asking.

Here is it's story:

As every nautical-minded lad (not naughty-minded, that's different. And also sorta similar.) knows, Skulls = Pirates. While skulls are fun and filled with 100% pirately goodness, they do tend to look sorta similar. So, any pirate worth his salt (salt was very expensive in the days of yore (your what? (Editor: Stop putting perinthetical thoughts inside perinthetical thoughts (Okay.)))) needs a skull logo, that's different from all the other skull logos. Most famous pirate's flags have a unique skull, or Jolly Rodrigo (am I pronouncing that correctly?) Look, there's a whole wikipedia entry on it.

(Red Rackhams Jolly Rodrigo)

Our Skull logo is based on the unique visage of Juthnika Cwobbey, First Mate to my great great great pretty good grandfather, ScurvyBeard The First. (I'm ScurvyBeard XIIth of course. ) Juthnika had a curious affliction that affects some sailors, known as Cartographers Skwintance, which causes some sailor-types to develop huge chins and squint.Or possibly it's just a really cool doodle I did in 8th grade math class. I'll take the secret to the grave! (Not my grave of course. I'm planning on being eaten to death by sharks. No, It's just that sometimes, on rainy days, when I'm forlorn, I like to take my collection of secrets to the graveyard for an airing. There's nothing so odd about that! PegLeg Pete takes his spoon collection to the movies! Stop laughing, or I'll have you keelhauled! (What does that entail, exactly? (Oh my.)))

Piratelympics

Day 14 of the International Pirate Cutlass Authenticity debate:

We have come to a decison. After alot of shouting, plankwalking, eye poking, and a very poorly thought-out karaoke contest, we have decided. In order to qualm the international pirate community, we have decided to hold the first annual piratelympics. Amid many other events, will be several swordfighting competitons. The kind of sword used by the person who wins the most events will be adopted as the offical SwordType of All of Piratedom. The Piratelympics will be hosted here in Pellmellia, becuase of it's rich, piratey traditions. While drawing up the rules, we didn't specify that the person entering has to be a pirate, so, thanks to the internet, any and all swordfighting people are allowed to enter. So far, we have 7 pirates, 2 samurai, a ninja, a clump of knights, and a beekeeper for some reason. This means, that if we pirates do not sweep the events, the offical sword of all piratedom could be not pirately at all!

I'm entering of course, hope to bring home the gold (The grand prize is the golden tooth of that great buckler of swashes, CrimsonBeard the Pretty Awesome. He didn't like us pulling his tooth out, so we waited until he was asleep.) I hope my sword, Slashy McCuttsabunch is up to the task.

Further bulletins as events warrant.

Pirate Cookies

One of our primary sources of revenue, is our sale of Pirate Cookies. We have cornered the market on sugary goods here in Pellmellia. Here, we bake a batch of cookies, package them in whatever boxes are handy, then hit the streets. They are available from stands and carts during our multiple-semi-monthly-kind-of-weekly-bi-annual-yearly Pirate Wednesday Parade, and we often sell them door to door (usually on days when we're particularly bored, or short on cash. Even without the cannons, our PirateVan sucks up the gas.) They are also available at Contrabanned Warehouse TM. (Unscrupulous Jim, owner of Contrabanned Warehouse pays us 1/3 of a bag of money everytime we say Contrabanned Warehouse . Contrabanned Warehouse.)

We're hoping to expand to non-Pellmellian markets, unfortunately, the rest of the world seems to have stricter health laws than we do.

One reason we don't export yet is because we don't use preservatives. They're not necessary for local sales because they sell so fast. We experimented using them before, but it was a fiasco. Our first mistake was in letting Lester mix up the chemicals. Chemistry is better left to those with thumbs. And a background in mixology. And people who can read enough to tell what the bottles actually say.

We tried claiming that the resulting explosion was all part of the Pirate Wednesday fun, but astute observers noticed this happened on a thursday, our entire apartment complex was destroyed, and that PW fun traditionally consists of island-wide treasure hunts, talking with a pirate-accent, (boy does that get old fast. We've limited ourselves to only using the accent on special special-occasions. Like press interviews. Mostly, we just shout YARG! alot) and hitting people on the heads for no apparent reason, then running away.

So, our PR rep at the union of Pirates, Buccinners and Swashbucklers had us spin the situation, blaming the explosion on the local vikings, (most people think a Pirate's cheif rival is a Ninja, but we actually get on quite well with the ninjas. Our Arch Nemises are the Vikings that run the local coffee shop. Darn them and their Vikuccinos!) but, seeing as how it was well known they were all attending the sheep-flinging seminar in Boomerangatang at the time, we had to admit our fault, and pay damages. (fortunately, due to the extremely confusing Pellmellian tax code, we were able to right these charges off, claim a deductable, get insurance money (that's how we say Scurvybeard lost his hand, even though we secretly know it was from a kaiyaking accident) and actually made money on the deal. (Gerald is the best accountant ever!)

Pirate Cookies come in the following flavors: Mint Dubloon, Rum-Raisin-Sans-Raisin, Dead Man's Chocolate Chip, Walk the Plank Peanut Butter, and of course, Pecan Sandies (made with authentic sand! Not that arrtificial sand you find in the off-brands).