I’ve always enjoyed talking like a pirate and saying things like “avast me hearties” and “shiver my timbers”. I think it’s high time I lived the dream and am interested in quitting my job and becoming a pirate full-time. I don’t yet own a parrot or pegleg. I do like Pirate cookies and spackle. I have just bought a sizable quantity of swabs and ship biscuit. I also beat up some kids and stole their lunch money. But how do I go about finding a bos’n and cap’n and setting sail on the high seas for some pillaging off the Barbary coast? Advice would be appreciated.
Look up the Dread Pirate Roberts and offer to help him retire.
This should give you all you need to break the laws of the US to become a pirate:
http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/18/ch81.html
Hope it helps! 
Tripler
Basically, you get yourself a boat and a firearm. (Shotguns are probably best because most of your combat will be at close range.) Then you go to the Caribbean (or wherever) and start robbing people. The number of crew you take with you depends on the size of your intended prey.
Stick to the tourists; they are most likely to have cash and things like cameras and watches and jewelry. You could raid anchorages by night, pull the old “vessel in distress” bit, or sail alongside guns a-blazin’, your choice. You’ll need to figure out ahead of time what to do with the people you capture; hold them for ransom, kill them outright, etc.
Watch out for the five-oh; weapons up to & including 20mm cannon on law enforcement vessels is not unheard of, plus they have radios. Firing on the law is a commitment - not a fling.
Remember that a good pirate never gets too greedy, otherwise he scares away all the traffic from the area and has to move into unfamiliar waters.
How about pirate school? I hear George W. Bush wants to give out vouchers to anyone who wants to go to pirate school, so you should be just fine.
If I could be anything in the world, I would be a pirate. Unfortunately, the pirates of today largely suck, and if I were to go back in time to join a pirate ship, I would probably have to be the scurvy wench, or something, because I am a girl. I really am starting to think I am a gay man trapped in a straight girl’s body, because it seems to me that anything worth being requires a set of testicles. Pirate? Check. Mafia crime boss? Check. Famous alcoholic writer? Check.
But anyway - I digress.
This is my list I made of how to be a pirate. It is far from complete, of course, but I think it provides a decent start.
How to Be Pirate
**1.Learn Pirate vernacular. **
Argh.
Matey.
Shiver me timbers.
Keel-haul.
Land-lubber.
Scurvy.
**2.Develop a Pirate Physique. **Obtain:
Peg leg or
Hook hand or
Eye patch or
Silver tongue
Scruffy beard.
Sea Smell is a MUST
1.Throw out soap.
2.Throw out deoderant.
3.Throw out shampoo.
4.No showering for three months (average time at sea).
**3.Give yourself a Pirate name. **
Blackbeard
Captain Hook
One-Eyed Willie
** 4.Find a ship. **
**5.Make sure it is a PIRATE ship. **
**6.Obtain job as Pirate on said Pirate ship. **
** 7.Congratulations! You are now a Pirate! **
From an old Overboard comic strip by Chip Dunham:
Pirate 1: How’d you get into pirating, man?
Pirate 2: I took a two-year course in college, worked summers on a pirate ship, got a job as a cabin boy here, and worked my way up–how about you?
Pirate 1: One night I stumbled out of a bar, someone threw a bag over my head, and I woke up ten miles out to sea.
Pirate 2: Hey–sometimes you find the job–sometimes it finds you.
And don’t forget pirate grammar - always speak in the present tense.
Big-ass boat? Aye.
Currently on the bounding main? Aye.
Colorful pirate lexicon? Aye.
Affinity for grog and other spirits? Aye.
Lusting after buxum babes on the high seas? Aye.
Facial scar? Aye.
Fearsome pirate name? Aye.
Instills fear into the heart of my crew? Aye.
Ahar, mateys! It seems I already be a pirate!
– Cap’n ChiefScott
sneeze: brilliant, sound advice. bravo.
chiefscott: respectfully, yer not a pirate til you make someone walk the plank.
essvee –
I have. At chiefs’ initiation each year. As a matter of fact, that’s kind of a “light” punishment for a chief’s initiation!
I’ve “crossed the line,” too. Now that’s as piratey as you can get, ye scurvy dog!
a bottle of rum would be a good start…and WENCHES! YEAH, WENCHES!!
you, sir, are a pirate, and id sign on in a hurry if i werent afraid youd keelhaul me for my insolence. aaarrrggh!
I’ve read over yer suggesions and I think they ring true, arrrrrgh. It seems like the first step is to hire some wenches. Me hearties, if ye be a wench and would like to serve aboard my dead man’s chest The Hydra then please sign up below. Otherwise, I’ll have to hire a press gang to form my crew. Yo ho ho!
Hire wenches?! What’s piracy coming to these days?!
Ten thundering typhoons! As a pirate, I hire people with the same benefits and dignity that Nike would offer any third world backwater. In return for selfless labour, hot monkey sex, cooking, cleaning, swabbing, looting, pillaging and a little dressing up like Davy Jones, I would gladly pay a seventy-third share of the loot, an occasional jigger of rum and all the scurvy you can eat. So howzabout it? 
Doc,
If you’re a pirate, aren’t you 200 years too late? The cannons don’t thunder, there’s nothing to plunder…
(Be thankful you can’t hear me sing it…)
Why on earth would you want to dress up like a Monkee???