monster puppet

This past weekend, my old friend Galen was in town. Gina and I had just been shopping for presents for friends' newborn babies. I bought a monster puppet. But we fell in love with the puppet too much, so we decided to keep it and I now have to find a new baby present for my friend. The three of us couldn't stop talking as the puppet. It's sort of like how Jim Carey putting on the mask in the movie The Mask...the puppet just sort of took over your personality.
He definitely came out in public with us.

We walked into Curious George, the really cool children's book shop in Harvard Sq. Whenever I head into a children's book shop, I offer to sign anything they might have in stock.

But this time I had a monster puppet.

I brought the books up to the counter.
And then the puppet said (in gruff monster voice), "Hello, would you like
for my friend here to sign these?" Now as odd as it sounds - people respond to the puppet. Even though my lips are moving, they look at the monster. So the monster carried on a conversation with the sales clerk and a woman witnessing this whole ordeal said, "Did you write that book?!"
The monster replied, "Yeah, and he illustrated it, too."

At this point my friends couldn't deal with the absurdity. We walked around Harvard Sq for another hour or so and then headed to the Border Cafe for some Mexican food. The monster puppet asked for a table. We were seated and oddly enough, people gave us looks. Mostly smiles. A monster puppet sure cheers people up. The people at the table next to us were talking about us. The monster puppet wouldn't stand for it.
In a gruff monster voice, he said, "Excuse me, I'm right here, I can hear you talking about me!" The woman at the table struck up a conversation with the puppet. Then turned to me and said, "I was that lady at the book store, I bought your (Punk Farm) book, because I teach music to elementary school kids. Could I take a picture with you?" Whoa. Needless to say, the monster facade was dropped, because that was just crazy. Even crazier - she was in town from - Wisconsin! What are the odds? Her friend asked, "So are puppets your thing?"

That's sort of an embarrassing question. But all ego has to be thrown out the door when you and your friends are walking around town with a monster puppet who talks to random people. "No, puppets aren't my thing."

But we did walk aorund to strangers and asked, "Could I take a picture of you with my puppet?"(we don't know these people)