Interview Possum

Submission 24,506

About

Interview Possum refers to a photograph of Sand Mountain Sam, an opossum who serves a similar role to Sand Mountain, Alabama, as Punxsutawney Phil does to Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania and much of the United States in that it can supposedly predict the weather. The image comes from the ceremony for Sand Mountain Sam's 2018 "prediction" for the remainder of winter and spread through Twitter as people added various captions to it.

Origin

Like Punxsutawney Phil, the famous groundhog who serves as the basis for Groundhog Day, Sand Mountain Sam is an animal associated with a superstition that if it sees his shadow on a certain day in February, it means six more weeks of winter in the Tennessee Valley area. At the 2018 ceremony for Sand Mountain Sam held February 2nd, 2018, Sam did not see his shadow, meaning an early spring in the area.^[1]

Spread

The day of the event, Facebook meme page Olivia's O'meme Outlet^[2] posted the picture with the caption "Pineapple is stored on the pizza," gaining 637 likes and reactions (shown below).

On February 4th, Twitter user @lizharvey tweeted the image with the caption "me tweeting," gaining over 560 retweets and 1,700 likes (shown below, left). The same day, Twitter user @pattymo tweeted a joke giving the possum the voice of a stand-up comedian, gaining over 1,500 retweets and 8,000 likes (shown below, right).

On February 12th, the image was posted to the Instagram account worstigaccount^[3] with a caption parodying right-wing talk show hosts, gaining over 1,400 likes (shown below). The image was reposted to /r/MemeEconomy^[4] on the 13th, gaining 390 upvotes (shown below, left). On the 16th, Twitter user @kallokisser posted the image with a caption from John Mulaney's standup, gaining over 78,000 retweets and 207,000 likes (shown below, right). The meme was covered by The Daily Dot.^[5]