New ”SpongeBob” episodes begin May 6 on Nick

Who lives in a pineapple under the sea? Unless you’ve been living in Davy Jones’ locker for the past six years, you’ll know the answer is SpongeBob SquarePants, the most popular invertebrate on television.

And if you’re hungry for new nautical nonsense after endless reruns from the first three seasons, Nickelodeon is ready to oblige with a wave of 20 premiere “SpongeBob” episodes on Friday nights beginning May 6.

“Kids were happy watching (reruns) for the 3,000th time,” says Tom Kenny, the voice of SpongeBob and his pet snail, Gary. “It was the parents who’ve been busting my chops for new episodes.”

Kenny says fans can expect SpongeBob to engage in further adventures with his superhero idols, Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy, and to be transported to the Middle Ages, where he meets his cranky neighbor Squidward’s ancestor, the world’s worst minstrel.

The high point of the season, he says, will be a “heartrending” half hour in which Gary runs away from home.

But anyone romanticizing about a love interest for SpongeBob can just keep dreaming, Kenny says: “Like the creature he anthropomorphizes, he’s forever asexual.”