Jul 19, 2006 17:25
Be brave as you read this and don't judge me too harshly, for I am about to rip apart what seems to be a national obsession, which appeals to my sense of humour as much as dipping my scrotum into a solution of sulphuric acid.
Sometime last year in London, I was accosted by a few "acquaintances" in the pub. They were wearing eyepatches, frilly shirts and spewing forth an incessant string of verbal diarrhea. I didn't think this was out of the ordinary; I was in the Devonshire Arms, after all. But I noticed that in addition to the drabness of the usual goth clothes, each one had a parrot stuck to their shoulder, or a skull and crossbones emblazoned on a rather large hat.
I feigned interest and enquired as to what the hell they were doing.
"Yarr it be National Talk like a pirate day, me hearty!"
It be what now? "yarr"? Are you serious? National Talk like a Pirate day, right. I wondered if there was such a thing or whether they were pulling my peg leg. After some brief research I discovered there is such a day. It's September 19th. On this day, if one is inclined to do so, one gets to walk around looking even more insane than usual, brandishing plastic cutlasses, speaking like a deranged Westcountry farmer and making all manner of boring, overdone "poop deck" jokes and references to Roger the Cabin Boy (who, by the way, never served aboard Captain Pugwash's ship with Seaman Staines or Master Bates).
I can manage one day a year when this happens. It does, after all, push the everyday stupidity and sheep mentality down the scale a bit. It certainly makes the other 364 days of mind-numbing tedium seem a little more manageable in comparison. But it's as if there are a number of people somewhere with the opinion that runs something along the lines of "No! We want to be annoying more than just one day a year!"
On the first week I came back to Plymouth, I went out to a nightclub I used to go to only to find, lo and fucking behold, that it was Pirate Night.
Actually, I was made aware of this before. So, needless to say, I dressed in something so utterly devoid of swashbuckling connotations that one person actually looked at me sympathetically, proudly showed me their beard -- which appeared to have been drawn on with brown felt tip and had subsequently melted down his neck like the product of some scatalogical initiation ceremony-- and had the nerve to say:
"Oops! I bet you feel a bit silly, huh?"
As if I'd forgotten it was mufti day in school, turned up in my uniform and started crying (which I did actually did once).
I felt silly? I wasn't the one who looked like Adam Ant after a mudbath. I wasn't the one strutting around a nightclub with a pound shop cutlass and a bandana wrapped around my head. I'm not just saying this because she'll be reading it, but the only person who looked any good as a pirate was my friend Jenna. The rest looked like some bizarre version of Captain Blood spliced with Lord of the Flies. No, thankyou. I did not feel silly.
What, in the name of all that is aesthetically pleasing and clean, is attractive, humourous or even REMOTELY sexy about pirates? If you go by the stereotypes (and let's face it, you do, judging by what I've had the misfortune to witness), you're talking about a band of scurvy-infested, middle-aged men (apart from two notable exceptions documented in history)) who haven't washed their hair in months, who spent their days murdering, thieving and getting hanged from the yardarm.
I can see how murdering and thieving might appeal to some people and it is not for me to take a moral highground, but for the love of grog, do it after a bath and a shave.
I have never seen Johnny Depp looking more disgustingly, atrociously ugly than as Captain Jack Sparrow. Usually, he does okay. I don't find him particularly attractive and never have, although I can see the appeal; but this is yet another facet of Jolly Rogering which eludes me. If you want to see a film where Johnny Depp hais matted hair, bad skin and an exotic outfit, watch Edward Scissorhands, because not only is it a great film, but he actually looks very beautiful in it.
I suspect it will always elude me, so it'd be a waste of time trying to educate me. And if anybody so much as goes "yarr" in my general direction any time soon, they'll actually be needing that eyepatch and peg leg that they think looks so cool.
Next week: "Your Band Sucks Ass" and "Bring Me the Head of Carol Vorderman".