What's with these people that own "Happy Birthday?"

Give it back!

If you don't know what I'm talking about, there are these people that own the rights to the song "Happy Birthday to You" and will not let anybody sing it unless you give them a hefty royalty check. They have had trouble enforcing this because people like to sing that song a LOT, especially at birthday parties.

They can really only catch you if you sing the song in a movie or on TV. That is hard evidence. For this reason, nobody ever sings "Happy Birthday" on television. They sing "For He's a Jolly Good Fellow" instead, which is a dumb song that nobody likes. Have you ever heard anybody sing that song for any reason in real life? Try busting out with it when someone at your workplace gets a promotion. No one will join in.

I spent all morning trying to find out exactly who the Happy Birthday people are, but could not. But I'm not giving up. These people are hiding in a mansion somewhere, getting fat off Happy Birthday royalty checks and laughing at us.

ATTENTION HAPPY BIRTHDAY PEOPLE: I WILL FIND YOU.

I know that you are reading this because you probably Google "Happy Birthday" every five seconds to make sure nobody is getting away with anything. I hereby DEMAND that you REVEAL YOURSELVES and stop charging everybody money to sing Happy Birthday. Otherwise I am gonna track you down and knock on the doors of all your neighbors and tell them what you're up to. I will do this by infiltrating the post office and asking if anybody knows of a mansion that a lot of checks are being sent to. Not too many people live in mansions.

and by the way, to whoever wrote "For He's a Jolly Good Fellow," I'm onto you too. I know that you really just ripped off "The Bear Went Over the Mountain." If you want to prevent me from telling everyone, e-mail me so we can discuss some bribes.