Sunday, March 04, 2018

Sunday Night Music Club v.52

In light of yet another tragic school shooting a couple of weeks ago, I decided to post this video of Sir Bob Geldorf and the Boomtown Rats playing their hit "I Don't Like Mondays".

This song explores the reasons, or lack of reasons, for a long-ago school shooting.

It was a time when school shootings were virtually unknown. Since then, it's tragically become an all-too-frequent event.

On Monday, January 29th, 1979, 16-year old Brenda Spencer opened a window in her house that faces the school, and started firing a little 22-calibre semi-automatic rifle at children who were waiting for the school gate to open. Even with a weapon as under-powered as that, in a few minutes she managed to kill 2 adults and wound 8 children.

After firing 30 rounds, she barricaded herself in her home. A reporter called the house during the standoff and asked her why she did it. She famously replied, "I don't like Mondays. This livens up the day."

Bob Geldorf heard the quote soon after, and set about to try and makes sense of what is obviously a senseless act of violence.

Brenda Spencer is still in prison, and probably will be for life. She's next up for parole in 2019.

The two adults she murdered are still dead.

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