I once had the whole world at my feet.

But then the globe broke under me, and I fell on all fours, hence
my bruised ego. (A sad sigh) I walked a starry path to people's hearts, they used to laugh when I tripped
over my cape, made love to a dove, or beat the meat of a pastrami sandwich with a foot long bread. But
now that I am a sad old loner with a billion folds in my orange, brown hair to open, but no one even
gives me their beautician’s name.

I worked as a standup clown at the local “Horny Rhino Circus”, where everybody was always whining
about the loneliness of our circus rhino. My job was to get the rhino to the stage. Not a hard task in
itself, trust me (a painful moan after “trust me”). No seriously I only had to run for my life everyday twice
for a living. It’s not as adventurous as it sounds, sometimes the rhino would decide on crushing someone
else’s bones for a change. But enough about me, there must be some of you who understand the
sadness and pain (sharp reaction to pain and then) not of broken bones but just, pain. Like the feeling
you get when another dweeb takes your place at the circus, or when the pie thrown at you is in a metal
tray, or when the trapeze jumper misses the rope and grabs your duck. Such was my life at the circus. A
lonely comedian with a serious disease. Get it? Serious? No? The guy who threw that pie didn’t either.

Now I’ll tell you a story. Picture this, an amazing audience of 15 people including a tattoo artist, an
ex-con, and an altar boy looking like the hunchback from Notre Dame. What more could you ask for from
an audience. It was later that day when I found out that the tattoo artist was there to draw abs on the
altar boy’s back and the ex-con was there to kick the boy’s ass for stealing his pastor. How crazy is that?
Well, that won’t sound half as crazy when I tell you about the time a politician crashed the circus party.
Don’t believe it? Well neither did he when his BMW crashed open the wooden gate and a gatekeeper
with it. And that wasn’t even the saddest incident of the day. It was when we discovered that the
politician was the father of the trapeze jumper. And he too liked my duck.

Imagine my grief when I found out that the trapeze jumper was having an affair with my juggling pins.
Yesterday he threw them high up in the air and glided under them with everything but grace while
constantly yelling, “Giggity Giggity”. (Wondering) Kind of reminds me of someone. But then he crashed
into my balloon tea party and spilled the tea all over him. I almost want him to get “fired” with me now,
but I’m afraid the teacups had gasoline in them. (Acting as if waiting for the audience to understand the
joke). (You can either choose to explain the joke or not)

I still remember the day I first signed up to be a circus clown. Man, I had never been happier in my entire
life. (Get increasingly excited while telling it) It was beyond anything I had hoped for myself. Me, finally
becoming a reason for people’s happiness (show intense excitement), chosen for a noble cause indeed
(picture of cheerfulness) But then (changing expressions back to sad tones), the trapeze jumper brought
out a can of hot paint, when I asked him what it was for, he replied, “you’re a perfect picture of a clown,
just need a small amount of this makeup and you’re done” (looking dejected, and even more sad).
Imagine my disgust when he said that. It’s not every day when you find out that the spiritual aura
looming out of you is that of a joker. (You can choose to repeat “a joker” for emphasis) Weirdly, his small
amount turned out to be my extra-large and my face looked like a mildly burned spaghetti sausage sliced
evenly for the trapeze jumper’s dinner. Oddly enough, this turned out to be true later that day.
Circus life was not fun, but it was with all its ups and downs. Speaking of ups and downs, the magician
did something weird last week. During his normal performance of the coffin cutter routine, he used a
prop as a replacement. But that day he asked for the acrobat. Spoiler alert, no one liked that bendy guy
at all. Anyway, I was saying, when the acrobat went into the coffin box, the magician, who probably had
a little too many shots of God knows what, got his magic words jumbled and said, “hocus pocus lemme
strokus”. Needless to share the grim details of what his saw did to the box. I will add however, we saved
the acrobat from further embarrassment by dragging his ass to the backstage. As for the magician, he
couldn’t “Abracadabra” his way back in time.

I used to think I was a decorated comedian, before I discovered a new genre of laugh, the pity laugh. It’s
when people “over-laugh” at any lame joke, they hear out of you. Happened to me a lot. I once got a
standing ovation on my “why’d the chicken cross the road” joke along with a military honor of stupidity
on my three-peat “knock knock” jokes. It goes like this: “why did the chicken cross the road? (Wait for
messages) to say hi to the loser. Knock knock (again wait for a message or two) hi losers, it’s the chicken.
It's sad, a guy was dying laughing after saying hi to me, after the premier ended, I asked him, “did you
enjoy that joke of mine dear sir?” (a minor wait) and he said, “No, I’m the tattoo guy who drew that
finger on the acrobat’s cannon” (wait for the viewers to figure out which finger you’re implying).

That’s the gist of my life, a flirty trapeze jumper, a drunk magician, a boring acrobat, a sad comedian and
a rhino with horns. There’s not a single more screwed up squad in existence, except maybe the cast of
“Marvin Marvin” (or any bad TV show that comes to your mind). If I’m being honest, they were all
pathetic idiots, but they were my pathetic idiots, I don’t know how much of an idiot that makes me
sound. I had my share of laughs, even if it was at myself, and cries, even if it was over spilt milk. And
speaking of spilled milk, our ventriloquist has decided to throw away his toy cow for good. It so
happened that during his closing act, the magician did something amazing, he threw 3 bottles of milk in
the air, and said, “Abra ca doodle doo”. The bottles came back empty. Later when we returned backstage,
we saw the ventriloquist’s cow on his lap and milk was coming out of his udders. Don’t know why the
ventriloquist fainted, but I saw real magic guys, let me tell you.

All right maa, I’m coming. That's it then fellas, I’ll leave you guys to your happy lives full of fun, cheer, joy,
and… (pausing and looking sideways as if asking someone) hey maa, what’s another word for happy?
(Pausing and then sad reacting) she told me to zip it and come teach her how to make random jokes. (a
sad smile sideways presumably still talking to maa, then agitation) now if I actually knew how to do that,
I wouldn’t be crashing at your place at (whatever time of the day) in the morning maa, now would I?
(Deliver the part from “Now if…” onwards in mock anger for effect). She’s coming with a wooden
spatula in her hand guys, I have to hide or else she’s going to break it on me and ask me for a new one.
(Prepare to leave the screen) but wait, I’m not leaving without my last joke, what do you get when a
circus clown is fired? (pause) an FBI inquiry and a NCIS episode, coz the guy is gone for good. No? Oh
well it was worth that pie with the paper plate. (encore)