Amy Lu's View

I am The Champion!

As I write this, I am entering the second week of my reign as The Queen of March Mammal Madness 2024. 

I won this year’s March Mammal Madness tournament by choosing the Great White Shark as the winner. 

Yeah, I won March MAMMAL Madness by choosing a fish. I’m sure this all makes sense, but I just haven’t put in the time or effort to understand March Mammal Madness. I just know that it’s based on a sports ball bracket thingy, and one of our friends organizes our participation in it. All I have to do is fill out a sheet that shows my picks for each bracket. 

I COULD spend time learning about the animals that are pitted against each other and thinking about my choices. And I did spend a little time thinking about my pick–if I didn’t know what an animal was, I occasionally Googled it. And unlike previous years (this is Year Four of Our Madness) I didn’t just pick animals that I thought were amusing or cool. I tried to think a bit about what might actually win. 

But I think it’s likely my opponents gave a lot more thought to their selections, so it’s kinda funny and awesome that I won. This could be a metaphor for the value of not overthinking things sometimes. But mostly it’s a little story about the randomness of the universe and how luck can sometimes negate hard work and knowledge. 

And maybe it’s an illustration of unconscious connection and meaning. I don’t think I picked the Shark because I’m into sharks…I  consider myself shark neutral…but writing this post is inspiring me to think about the cultural associations  and symbolism of sharks.

The first thing I think of about sharks is jumping them. Er, that sounds problematic or criminal. To clarify, I think of the phrase “Jump the Shark”–the point where an artistic or entertainment endeavor starts to go downhill in terms of quality, popularity, and/or integrity. It refers to the episode of “Happy Days” when The Fonz does a stunt where he literally jumps over a shark on water skis (The Fonz is on the skis, not the shark). 

I watched a lot of Happy Days in my youth, but I don’t know if I specifically watched that episode. I don’t have an opinion of how good Happy Days was before or after it. But I do wonder if I could, or have, or will, Jump the Shark. 

Maybe? But if I apply this to whatever “artistic” endeavors I have or will be involved in, I think it’s highly unlikely. Not because I’m artistically pure, but I don’t think the “math” adds up–I don’t have enough talent or popularity to Jump the Shark. I don’t think there is any song too cheesy for me to sing, to role for me to goofy to play, or any latch hook–wait, it’s already latch hook, enough said.

As long as I’m doing my best with something that I in some sense enjoy that I don’t find offensive, I think my artistic integrity is fine. 

So if my subconscious was encouraging me to consider Jumping the Shark through my March Mammal Madness pick–done. There are many other shark associations: Baby Shark, Shark Tank, “Sharks Don’t Get Cancer” (a book from 1992) but none of those really interest me (except Baby Shark, which I sang in story time long before it became a cultural phenomenon/parental scourge). 

But…there is Land Shark. 

I’m just going off memory here, but I fondly remember Land Shark as a repeating skit from the first years of Saturday Night Live (yes, I was a kid with insomnia and without a bed time). I think Land Shark would kill people by ringing their doorbells and getting them to let him in by pretending to be the Avon Lady. I’m not sure what the point of Land Shark was (the gullibleness of modern Americans? Our inability to recognize danger? Avon is scary? Everyone in the 70’s was high?) or why it was funny to anyone, much less a 7 year old (although in addition to the insomnia, I was likely also high on Sudafed).

If my subconscious is trying to tell me something, is it warning me not to be the victim of a Land Shark type threat…or am I Land Shark?

I think the lovely folks behind March Mammal Madness intend it to be a fun way to engage folks in science and to encourage learning about animals. They probably didn’t intend it to inspire middle-aged ladies to ponder cultural touchstones from their youth, or to look for messages from their subconscious. 

That’s okay, different goals, but not mutually exclusive…as long as we all agree I am the Winner, the Champion, the Queen, the Goddess, the Almighty Benevolent Potentate of March Mammal Madness (at least until next March).