Show Me Your Teeth-It's Shark Week

PaintedShark, originally uploaded by carolsLittleWorld.

It’s that time of year again. It’s the time of year when people seeking shelter from the blasting hot mid-day sun by dipping their toes into the ocean give pause. It’s the time of year when people taking high dives off diving boards into cool crisp swimming pools suddenly stop and question what they are doing. It’s the time of year when children wading in kiddie pools suddenly rise up, start crying, and run for the back porch. It’s the time of year when people staring at an otherwise harmless glass of water on their desk hesitate before taking that big gulp.

It’s shark week.

Shark week is both a wild fantasy and a harsh reality for many of us. I mean, sure we know sharks are out there, we know they have great big teeth and all, and we know they’d just love to have us for lunch (it’s that whole “top of the food chain” bit and all) but, still, we tend to forget. We tend to forget, tend to put this out of our minds, keep it away from our busy heads, and just ignore that fact. Hey, we’ve got cooler, more fun things to do-things like surf, swim, snorkel. Sure, I mean, everybody *knows* there’s sharks out there, right? But, like that doesn’t mean we have to live in fear of them, do we? Do we? (You afraid? ‘Cause I’m not. Really. Well, not unless you keep reminding me by playing that theme from Jaws over and over again while pointing at the big giant teeth. Ok, yeah, so maybe I am afraid. Maybe just a *little* bit afraid. Something wrong with that? Isn’t everybody at least a little bit afraid of sharks? Come on, admit it. I know you are.)

The musical theme for this year’s Shark Week is “Show Me Your Teeth” by Lady Gaga. Now, I really don’t know which is scarier-the big giant sharks with biting teeth or the fact that Lady Gaga is somehow now associated with Shark Week. There’s a whole new set of nightmares waiting for that to happen now, isn’t there? It’s kind of like Tim Burton doing a special version of Hell for the Broadway stage. This is like death meets destruction. This is like Hell meets high water, this is like, well, Lady Gaga and Sharks. Yipes!

Ok, so that now we’ve established that the world is full of nothing but BIG sharks with BIG teeth that are all just suddenly out to get me, what more can I say? I think I need to switch to de-caf and totally stop drinking unflavored water. That glass of water sitting on my desk, waiting, just daring me to take a sip now? Yeah, that’s so *not* going to happen, ok? I’m not even going to touch that thing, not even with a 10 foot pole. (Did you see that? Did it just like move a little bit? Is that water like flowing in the glass somehow? Like something’s going to rise up out of it. Yeah, right, I’m so drinking booze on for the rest of the week-as far as I know, sharks don’t much care for swimming in Bourbon and Coke, ok? And I can only hope that, in my soon to be drunken stupor, I don’t come across any Lady Gaga on the radio. That would *so* not be too nice right about now.)

Hey, it’s shark week. What did you expect?

Until next time…