Of all the things I learn in 2009- and thus far, four months in, it's looking like I'll learn a lot of weird-ass things- perhaps the most shocking will be that there are pirates.

Yes, honest-to-God, swashbuckling pirates.

OK. So, admittedly, these guys don't do as much 'swashbuckling' as they do, say, aim giant rocket-propelled weapons at boats. AND, I knew there were pirates and that pirating has been even more prevalent in recent years than since the days of tri-cornered hats (still trying to bring that one back...) but never before have they been so prominently splashed across our TVs, newspapers and internets.

It's very surreal, hearing about pirates for weeks on end. Because ask any five year old what a pirate looks like, and I'd bet "a 14 year old Somalian boy in an inflatable raft" is not likely to be his description. No, he'll describe a big ol' bearded guy, probably speaking a pretty gnarly form of English with an equally gnarly English accent. He'll probably be dressed not wholly unlike a British revolutionary war soldier, but... y'know... shabbillier. And he'll have a parrot, for-absolute-fucking-sure. AND one or an assortment of the following: peg leg, hook hand, eye patch, scurvy.

AND he'll be on a big ass ship. With skulls and cross bones on the sails.

Now- these guys MAY have had scurvy. It's hard to say.

But what they don't tell you when you're five is that "pirate" just means "guys in a boat who hijack other guys in a boat." And "boat" can also mean "raft," or really "something that floats on water and can hold some dudes." Actually, you wouldn't even necessarily need a boat at all to be a pirate... if you can swim out to a navy vessel with a dagger in your teeth and take the thing over, well.. then I guess you'd be a pirate.

But I'll take what I can get, pirate-wise. It's novel just hearing people say "pirate" a whole lot without it being immediately followed by the word "Depp."

Ed. note: As I transcribe this from my journal from three weeks ago, I can't help but be stricken by the fact that ALL the news has been weird in 2009, as now every other news report is about swine flu.

Of course- by the time I post my comic about swine flu, there will be grasshoppers the size of Saint Bernards, eagles will have taken Southeastern Maine by force, real Leprechauns will be discovered, and Funyuns will have replaced dollar bills as the favored (flavored?) currency.