I know it was a few weeks ago already but I was reminded of this story recently and had to share.

It was in Charleston, WV when Mike and I were in the circus. This was right before a 2 week break in the tour so everyone was gearing up for a vacation and when you work with a bunch of clowns, no really, things get weird as people get punchy.

I walked into clown alley, our dressing room, and the two main trouble makers come up to me and tell me that I need to run an obstacle course they made. It was a slow day so I asked cautiously, “What do I have to do?” They showed me a red cane and said, “It’s easy, take this, put it on the floor and put your forehead on it so you’re hunched over and turn in circles until you get really dizzy. When you’re dizzy enough we’ll say go and you run around the chair, jump over the basket and come back here.”

That was the stupidest obstacle course I’d ever heard of and I told them so. They insisted that I couldn’t do it and said if I wasn’t up to it they could get Richard to do it who was probably a better a clown than me anyway. I said, “Give me that stupid cane.” So I put one end on the floor and my forehead to the other end and turned in circles until they said go and I ran around the chair and over the basket and came back to where I started without a problem. According to them I just wasn’t dizzy enough so to really show them I did it all again and I was even faster than the first time.

Right after I sat down at my trunk, feeling very proud of myself, Richard walks into the alley and they explain the whole thing to him and he agrees to do it. So he bends over with his head on the cane and spins in a circle. When he gets up and goes for the chair I see that he has huge red smudge on his forehead where the cane use to be. My jaw hit the floor. I grabbed my mirror to look at my forehead and sure enough, I had a big red smudge on my face. Those lousy clowns put red clown make-up on the end of that cane. I quickly fixed my make-up before Richard could see me.

The only thing that makes you feel better after getting a joke played on you is to play it on someone else. I want to thank Richard, he was always there for me.

Miller