NPR.

So Robert,

So Robert, I was...

So Robert, I was watching the Oscars this week and I was thinking that maybe we need a little bit more

glitz and glamour in our award show.

I know right? Like our awards show is for the best writing in an obscure government

document called the beige book and the word beige just doesn't have the

pizzazz of that golden Academy Award.

But you know, Whelan, the Baysh book was, once upon a time, a little more sexy.

Ooh, are you talking about a scandalous past?

I am.

In the 1970s, the Beige book was a secret document published inside the Federal Reserve

for Fed Eyes only. And get this, the cover of it was red. They called it the red book.

Whoo, sounds too hot to handle. Too hot it turns out for everyone because when they decided to release this

document to the public they didn't want that bright flashy red cover to give

everyone the wrong idea so they slapped on a tan cover, which now that I think about it, even that sounds

too risque, tan.

So it is now...

Well, you didn't say flesh-colored.

Oh, that's good.

Nude colored.

No, no, no, no, it shall now and forever be known as the beige book. Okay, that's nice and anodyne, but is it still filled with red-hot economic anecdotes inside?

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