The day Fred Schneider's "Monster" died.

Newscoma pointed me toward a great clip wherein Fred Schneider of the B-52s read aloud from Scott McClellan's book on The Daily Show. It's pretty hilarious and I'm thinking that whenever I find myself reading a book that needs some extra added oomph, I'll read it as if it were lyrics in a B-52s song as well.

I'm also reminded of something that we can call a public confession if you like. Way back when, when I worked at the record store, there was a coworker we'll call Paul. He was an interesting fellow. Quirky and articulate, a bit of a dreamer, he was an all-around nice guy. Paul was a big fan of the B-52s. The rest of us could really take or leave that band, but we indulged his obsession as he'd go on and on (and on and on) about the band's history.

We indulged for only so long though. When Paul obtained a promo copy of Fred Schneider's solo release, Fred Schneider & the Shake Society, he played that tape in-store daily. Maybe he played it two or three times daily. I can't remember. After about a week or so of this repeated heavy-rotation, we, Paul's fellow employees, "lost" the tape. Or maybe it "broke." I can't recall. It was a good enough tape, but one can only listen to a man sing about a "monster in my pants," so many times. Poor Paul.