title: Python to convert these dates to the right format for plotting
body: <p>I have a long list of dates formatted like the below:</p>
  
  <pre><code>8-JAN-18
  6-JAN-18
  24-DEC-17
  19-DEC-17
  12-JAN-16
  9-JAN-16
  13-NOV-15
  28-OCT-15
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>I am trying to plot a yearly histogram of these dates; would I be able to use pandas to plot these as is- or do I need to convert them first? And if so, how do I convert these to the right format?</p>
  
  <p>I can use a python script to read in the file and iterate over every line, replacing JAN, FEB, MAR, etc.. with it's respective number. Alternatively I can use sed/awk to do the same, remove the dashes, and add as '20' to the years, but is there a quicker way of doing it with pandas?</p>