and then there was blood...

once upon a birthday party...


i was a clown and found myself surrounded by some semi-cute kids (if you're ever interested, ask me about my ranking of cute babies by racial groupings. it's astounding.) making balloon animals, playing some games, demonstrating some magic, etc. all in a days work as a mediocre-clown.

one child (male, age 8) was, well, annoying. needed so much attention from the clown and the other kids that he would run around and slide on his dress pants even though he was told explicitly not to by his father. he wanted to be the 'helper' every time but not in that helpful way. it was in that annoying 'please shut up because i will never in a million years pick you' kind of way. he wanted to be first to get balloon animals or take a role in a game. not only this, but he couldn't keep his hands off other kids. if it was the magic show portion then it required him kicking someone. if it was the game portion, then he would 'accidently' fall on another kid. I warned him that if he couldn't stop being rough, he would get to go sit with his parents. in short, he was on my nerves, and even though i'm a clown and supposed to love all children, i don't

all the boys wanted balloon swords (well, they wanted balloon guns, but i don't provide such items without at least a 3 day wait period). this, of course, becomes a war of the swords. well, annoying boy, because he lacks the attention he wants, starts to rough house... AGAIN!

just as i was about to make my last balloon animal for the night and head out for an evening that would turn out to be oh so fun, i hear the words no clown wants to hear "HE'S BLEEDING!"

the child that couldn't be calm had worked himself into a frenzy, fallen, slammed his face into the floor and knocked out a loose tooth. blood was spilling from his mouth-- ON TO MY FRESHLY LAUNDERED, MULTI-COLORED PARACHUTE O' FUN!!!!

All he could yell was, "Where's my tooth? Where's my tooth?"

and all I could think was "He's bleeding on my equipment!!!"

I hurriedly looked for help from other adults not dressed as clowns in search of his father. I was met with frustrated grunts that i was disturbing their dinner. the father was found, the bleeding child was cared for, and i got out of that room before i could be accused of some horrid violent act that never occurred.

I mean, the kid was obnoxious, be he didn't really bother me too bad until he messed with the parachute.