"I stay up late - till half past three! And that's a peg below me knee!"

This morning, once again, I find myself indebted to Twitter.

Daily, I learn last night's sports scores, things that happened on this day in history, and top headlines from the New York Times.

And it's all great.

But it's a rare occasion that I learn of a holiday I didn't know existed.

Yes. Today is International Talk Like a Pirate Day.

It's 1995 at the YMCA in Albany, Oregon. Two racketball playing friends began speaking like pirates, and declared that people throughout the world should do the same one day each year.

The reason it's so cool, aside from the obvious pleasure of talking like a pirate, is that the holiday has the Internet to thank for its popularity. Save for a Miami Herald article in 2002, word of the day spread throughout the world virtually.

Now, there's 'post like a pirate' and an 'English-to-Pirtate translator' features on Twitter, and an 'English (pirate)' option for primary language on Facebook.

There's pirate language guides, Youtube tutorials, a TLAP 2009 events schedule.

Do you know what "Arrr!" actually means? The lingo guide does:

It can mean, variously, "yes," "I agree," "I'm happy," "I'm enjoying this beer," "My team is going to win it all," "I saw that television show, it sucked!" and "That was a clever remark you or I just made." And those are just a few of the myriad possibilities of Arrr!

My personal fav is pirate pickup lines. I reckon that if I were a wench living of the coast of somewhere, courted daily by pirates, I would have fallen for one/and/or all of them. Enjoy.

Avast, me proud beauty! Wanna know why my Roger is so Jolly?

How'd you like to scrape the barnacles off of me rudder?

Yes, that is a hornpipe in my pocket and I am happy to see you.

Try to throw some pirate lingo into your vernacular today, my fellow landlubbers.