February 2nd - Alexander Selkirk Rescued

On this day, in 1709, the Scottish Sailor, Alexander Selkirk, was rescued after being marooned on an island for four years. He would have stayed longer but he was sick of coconuts. His lazy four years of tropical paradise were not a complete waste of time as his story was probably inspiration for the novel Robinson Crusoe.

Alex was born in Fife, Scotland when he was zero years old. He was the son of a shoemaker, and as the saying goes, the cobbler'schildren have no shoes. It is not known if Alex owned shoes throughout his formative years, but if sweeping generalisations are anything to by, he most likely did not.

In his shoeless, formative years, Alex was known to be quarrelsome and he swore that one day he would be marooned on an island for some peace and quite for four years. No one took him seriously but he showed them. He showed them all.

His first step to intentionally marooning himself in his fortress of solitude was to get a job on the high seas. He this he did with Gusto, his faithful man-servant. Alex and the non-existent Gusto (aka gusto) become buccaneers in the South Seas. Today, we use buccaneer as a synonym for pirate but there were some differences between the two types of sailor. Buccaneers tended to attack coastal cities rather than other ships, and they restricted their activities to the South Seas. It is thought that the two terms became interchangeable because many pirates would try to impress young girls by saying they were not disreputable pirates, but were in fact lovable, adventurous buccaneers. Young girls, being naive as they are, believed these lies and went on to destroy the English language. Is there anything we can't blame on young girls?

A fateful last sailing trip lead to Alex's marooning. He complained that the ship he was on was unseaworthy, so he decided to stay on an uninhabited island, where the ship was restocking, and wait for another ship to pick him up. None of the other crew were convinced to go with him so Alex was left alone with gusto. Immediately, he regretted the decision and chased the ship, but it was to no avail. The next four years and four months would be spent playing the most unexciting game of eye-spy ever.

At first, he was afraid of the animal noises that came from the middle of the island, but he was soon forced inward by the disgusting sound of hundreds of sea-lions in mating season. He built two huts, a parents' retreat, and a double garage with plenty of overhead storage. For food he hunted feral goats that had been introduced by sailors in the past. He even domesticated some feral cats to protect him from being attacked by rats at night.

Alex gave up two opportunities for rescue when the island was visited by Spanish ships. As a Scotsman and a privateer he did not want to be caught by the Spanish. He was probably a horrible racist too. Eventually he was rescued by someone who wasn't a greasy wog.

Alex went back to normal life and married a widow. He lived another decade and died while serving on the Royal ship Weymouth. He never received any royalties for being the inspiration for the story Robinson Crusoe. Nor did he receive any money for his delicious recipe for feral goat in coconut sauce with a side of coconut salad in coconut sauce.