Peg Legged and Fancy Free

Gather round and I shall regale ye with tales of the Sea, and how She has taken time and again from me, yet never seen fit to repay me for my losses. I have lost many an appendage/organ to the sea and those creatures who dwell in it.

I lost my first leg to Scurvy while crossing the Atlantic. My quartermaster, Yuri (RIP), had assured me that we had more than enough Vitamin C, in the form of oranges, when we left port. He was a man of short stature and short temper, so this question was a calculated risk that I was taking. He was a member of my crew as a matter of last resort. I had gotten a late start in the human resources campaign, and so my crew was made up of two dozen lazy, inexperienced, disloyal, gluttonous, murdering, alcoholic illiterates. Yuri, however, was no illiterate. He did, however, have a great penchant for screwdrivers. This is why three weeks into our voyage, we ran out of the aforementioned oranges.

Yuri hanged himself from the cross-spar two days later when he couldn't handle the withdrawal.

We did have limes and grapefruit aplenty, which are also great sources of Vitamin C. So all was well in that department. However, the issue of my leg being lost is due to one of crewmen bringing his pet alligator, Scurvy, on board. He had told me that it was his luggage, and I had heard that alligator was back in style, and ... nevermind. It was not as painful as it could have been. I was in the great haze of a rum stupor. I was actually laughing profusely at how his luggage seemed to be smiling as it 'ate' my leg. When I finally realized what happened, the alligator had taken his meal and scampered back down below. I being too drunk, and minus a leg, was unable to pursue, and resigned myself to my fate.

When we arrived at our destination, I made a visit to the local doctor and had a peg leg attached. This peg leg was no designer original, but I did pay a pretty price in gold for it. Not even two fortnights after we had begun our return trip, I awoke one morn to find that me leg had been chewed right off by a band of rogue termites that had been afloat at sea on their ship, the SS Driftwood. Me crew, thinking it was a bad omen, quickly threw me overboard. It was during this time while I floated aimlessly on the high seas that I was attacked by a diabetic shark. Apparently he/she/it wanted my KitKat bar that I was holding for a special occasion. I thought that having my hand ripped of my wrist was painful, then I submerged it in the briny sea. I washed ashore an island where I regained conciousness. As luck would have it, a reknowned hand surgeon just happened to be vacationing on this tropical paradise. He was however too drunk to perform a transplant. (And yes, there were several hand donors on that island.) So instead, I was treated with the standard stainless steel hook. He threw in a free peg leg to replace the one I had lost earlier. [As a side note, this peg leg was a bit of a collector's item. The old blind man who had carved my prosthetic was a local celebrity, in that he was the reigning World's Fastest Whittler. Ironically, his prize was an all expenses paid trip to this island.]

Having the worst trip of my life so far, I walked out toward the shore. As I looked up to scream at the sky, a bastard gull swooped in a shat on me. As my fortune would have it, I was able to shut my eyelids just in time. However, it had not fully set in to my brain that my hand was no longer a hand, and so this is why I wear a patch over me left eye to this day.

These are the events of my ill fortunes, and to this day every time I set out upon the sea, I always pour the necessary libations to appease the gods, and the Mother Sea herself.