Dear Reader,

I’m going to be that dad. Yes, that dad that no matter how much my daughter begs me to stop doing something that embarrasses her, I won’t. I just won’t, and here’s why:

The great make-believe comedy writer Benjy Stone said it best, in the movie “My Favorite Year,” “Jews know three things — suffering, where to find great Chinese food and funny.”

And this my friends is Funny, with a capital F.

The back story

Allow me a few sentences to set this up before you pee in your pants. Two years ago, my daughter Mallory, a junior at the University of Western Washington, made the Jewish news world go bonkers when she created a viral video combining the call of sea lions with the blasts of the shofar. The Forward, JTA, Times Of Israel, The Cleveland Jewish News, all wrote stories about her and carried the video. Heck, Rabbi Erica Asch of Temple Beth El in Augusta, Maine, gave her a shoutout in her Erev Rosh Hashanah Sermon.

@loganlermansupremacist#duet with @aquariumpacific i know that the sounds aren’t PERFECT but still. happy rosh hashanah! #jewish #jewishtiktok♬ Sea Lions are LOUD Aquarium of the Pacific – AquariumofthePacific

When the video picked up steam, I suddenly realized my daughter Mallory Palmer was actually funny, despite her mother’s best efforts.

How does a video go viral? Well, when people you don’t know see it, and then make posts like this, it just goes and goes.

Try listening to this 100 times. 😂 pic.twitter.com/GV277Kwkm8

— Johnny Kunza (@johnkunza) August 23, 2020

I have no idea who Jonny Kunza is, but after he tweeted out Mallory’s video, the fun began. We got calls from more than 30 synagogues from Brooklyn to San Diego, Carmel, and Brisbane, Australia, all asking for permission to use the video in their virtual services or invite Mallory to join them on Zoom.

Messages poured in from family and friends who said the video was shared to them multiple times by people who didn’t know Mallory, but could not stop laughing and had to share it.

“I’ve been thinking about this all day and I just have to do it, I have to, I have to,” says Mallory in her intro in the clip.

Then she says “tekiah,” one of the traditional shofar sounds — but instead of a shofar responding, a sea lion delivers a single call that could fit right in during Rosh Hashanah or Yom Kippur services.

“Shevarim,” howls Mallory and another sea lion responds with the staccato sounds of the nine-note blast (actually the “teruah” call, but who’s counting). For “tekiah gedolah,” the extended tone that concludes the shofar service, multiple seals offer their call at once.