A new leaf for Shark Week

My main pop-cultural reference point for Shark Week—other than the thing itself—is 30 ROCK, wherein Tracy Morgan’s Tracy Jordan exhorts his audience to live every week like it’s, you know. So when I read a greeting card declaring its recipient “the human version of Shark Week,” this reads straightforwardly as a compliment: You are rare, vicious, and to be cherished, or words to that effect.

So I was surprised, showing this to my teenage daughter, to get the reaction “ew, how is that a good thing?”

I tried to explain the basic facts and cultural connotations of Shark Week, but she’s 13 and not that interested in history. Eventually she explained, “I thought it was the week of your period.“

Reader, maybe you knew where this was going all along, but I about sprained my diaphragm from laughing.

I’ll never use it, of course. But it makes me happy to know it’s out there.

Currently listening: Last Call, by Tim Powers, read by Bronson Pinchot.