a review

You wouldn't think so, but circuses sometimes stop traveling and actually put down roots. If your circus skills are in the art of clowning, then where ever you live tends to be called “The Clown House.” Makes sense, especially if you work as a clown...um...yeah.
Our Clown House formed almost 10 years ago in Eugene then shortly moved to Portland after the birth of our first child. We landed in the Mississippi neighborhood at a time when lots of buildings were boarded up, people where desperate ,and crime was high. It was a great place to raise kids.
One night I got word that a clown named Ziggy was to be featured in a show on Alberta street, word was that he was great, one of those “super talents” who can carry a crowd with skill , focus, and all those things we strive for.
If this guy was around, I needed to scope him out and see if he wanted a job with our crew.
I dressed as a bum, I mussed my hair, smeared a bagel sandwich with cream cheese into my goatee and then squeegeed it out with my fingers, I wore a shirt inside out and ran through a mud puddle, for character I also drank some fortified wine from a paper sack and crapped my pants a little.
It was my first time on Alberta street during a last thursday event, it was in a back room behind the Star E Rose Cafe, that was when the Community Cycling Center was in the small spot where Thunderbird records is now. I sat in the crowd and watched the show, nobody talked to me. It was Last Thursday so the crowd was thick with all types of people and I may have even seen a boob slip out of a womans dress in the shuffle of human traffic.
After I was done spying, I walked out into the street and ran into an early version of March Fourth Marching Band banging away. So much was going on I almost puked (it may have been that my choice of drink was also exited to leave my gut).
Well, needless to say, after discovering the fantastical scene taking place on Alberta street, we began going to Last Thursday events and working the street-clown angle.
We gathered crowds by playing Clownabilly music, then entertained them with feats of skill and stupidity (the human block head, stunt puking, fire spinning, and stand up) it made pretty decent money, and was a great way to try out new stuff on an audience.
After a time, a cafe appeared in our neighborhood near Mississippi ave. then a dvd store and some bars. The Max train was coming in close to our place, and within a year or two we could no longer afford to live there or go to any of the restraunts. Our landlord served us a no-fault eviction (so he could remodel, and jack the rent up even more), and we fanned out on tall bikes looking for the next Clownstead.
One of our guys happened to be riding past a big-ass hundred year old house with a huge yard and no roof. The fella who owned it was busy working on it, but stopped to hail the guy to stop and tell him whats the deal with the oversize bike? After he found out we were looking for new digs, he decided to let us move in and trade some work for rent as well. Thats how we got here.

We do a lot of shows. they are all different but they do fall into categories. The “Field show” is what the Last Thursday crowd sees each month. We also do “Bar gigs” (indoor stunts, music, nudity, and swearing), and “Carpet gigs” (no stage, walk around and entertain people, pick pocket). You get the idea. Each situation takes its own strategy. When we do fairs, parades and bike events we employ only Clown House crew. The big show looks made up and wild, but is really scripted. Last Thursdays, we invite lots of non show biz folks to join in. It becomes really chaotic and unpredictable, and it's hard to have a pay day in those conditions. Usually it's five people busking for four hours to gain $30 to split between us, so it's always helpful to have the individual crew members pay themselves by selling art, shirts, bullets and porn, or whatever. My wife and I have a hot dog cart, Will Workforf Ood sells rainbows, but sadly only gets paid in kicks to the groin.
But it's not about money (yes it is) we love interacting with the people on Alberta, lots of people stand at the crummy fence and watch us work on stuff or hold classes. We have taught a lot of people to weld metal, yoga, everything bike related and we usually have something nice up our sleeves during holidays.
I sometimes sucks to live in public but it's also cool to give away bikes to people who cant afford them or whatever they seem to need.
Summer 2006 : we have CHEERLEADERS!
September's field show has a group of cheerleaders dressed in red and white who dance around in the Mud Pit of Doom, they give the crowd something to look at while we decide what to do next. Will Workforf Ood, Pinga De Clown, Buddha Sprout, and I run the show while random kids (plus the one I own) and Banjo the Clown Dog pitch in talent. The cheersquad is headed up by Bizzy Bawdy; the hat girl is Marlyn Mon-ho. On the sidewalk, Chlorine Enema Jones is running the dog cart.
It started slow this time, not many folks around for a lot of the daylight time. The guys remodeling across the street opened up a wall and watched the show out of a hole in the side of a building. As cool as that looked, I still would have rather seen my friends (who had been there 13 years) who got evicted still living in that room.

Buddha wanted to mud wrestle because she knows it will be one of the last parties of the year, and our lease is up next August. Buddha duked it out three or four times (3 of them vs. a fella called Bump, and the other time vs. a person from the crowd.) When they wrestle in the mud they look so fierce, like spawning crocodiles. We made the mix more soupy than usual, so the mud flew and the flash photography went off like fireworks. Sauce pulled in around sundown with a backpack P.A.. I tried to run a time lapse camera, but didn't read the instructions so none of it came out. Will Workforf Ood was himself and did a great job of it.

The cameras really did go off like mad, good thing because we don't have a camera most of the time so we depend on people posting photos of us online so we can use them. When I see the flash I always look to see how expensive the camera is, if they are in my yard taking pics of me with an expensive camera without my permission I ALWAYS try to interupt the photography. Why? say someone takes a picture of Will Workforf Ood crashing a bike into a wall and landing on his nuts, they sell the photo for a couple hundred bucks done deal (it's happened too many times) well that person only had to walk up, push a button and leave, W.W.O. on the other hand had to spend years learning his craft, buying face paint, going to hours and hours of practice and planning meetings and still everyday he gets his dinner from a dumpster, it's not fair, and I'm the boss so it's my job to turn photography into a sport ITS IN THE BIBLE!
We did the fireman sketch, that's Buddha Sprout on top of the building set we have in the yard, as the rest of us (dressed as firemen) stand under her yelling for her to jump into out giant target, but she cant jump without first throwing down her baby, her free Internet service cd-roms and her ugly baby... I won't give away how it turns out.
A kid named Joe kept the crowd busy before we started the skit, by juggling, he looked great in high top sneakers and a big smile, I've been watching him grow up over the last few years and I defiantly see our influence, he can juggle, spool ride, tell jokes and he has begun drinking too much coffee (just kidding) We start the scene with a large fireball to get the crowds attention. As I was preparing the fire cannon, I noticed the people watching me walk behind Joe with a square metal can of Coleman fuel, and didn't want to upstage him. I yelled “Pay no attention to the guy with the can of blowy-uppy stuff. Nothing to see here, folks. Watch the kid!”
I ran around so much, I ended up wiping out on the sidewalk and giving my leg a nasty road rash, my voice was going quick from screaming. I was in a hurry because I still had to work as a dish washer that night, and I got sloppy with my clowning, if thats at all possible.
We ran through the rest of the set rather quickly, too quickly , as some kids held the crowd by rolling around on the giant spools, we stood in a circle scheming:
“What's next?”
“Donnow. What do you think?”
“********.”
So I just blurted out, “nekkid pie joust?”
Two clowns immediately said
“Ok.”
The Stumptown Jug Thumpers sat in the twilight of the day, playing music as Sauce and Pinga removed their clothing and selected tall bikes. They took their positions on Alberta street. Will, Bizzy, and Marilyn all helped with corking traffic. Marilyn took the chance to peel money out of the crowd, by saying we needed money to get Pinga some clothes.
It was awesome to see the people on the street and in cars just stop what they were doing upon beholding two nude clowns on tall bikes.
I ran inside and made a concoction of water, bread crumbs and corn meal and glopped it in two pie tins, we don't use whipped cream anymore because it makes your hair and clothing stink for weeks, we don't often use real pie because ...we eat pie.
Before the joust, Pinga got into some trouble, I handed him a pie and from behind him came a flurry of rocks and street gravel, a lady it seems...was upset.
This church lady was so offended by the nude white guy that she called him sinful and scooped up watery muck from the gutter and throw it at him right in front of her grand children.
Pinga didn't know that Jesus was never nude and the body is an object of shame, Now if Pinga or Sauce where to have been “aroused” you can guarantee that at least six people from the crowd would have beat him into the ground, Unaroused it's art.

It's so fitting that the bible lady was the first to throw stones haha how biblical, I wanted to interrupt her tirade of hate to ask her about how believable a puritan interpretation of a medieval interpretation of an ancient religion really is, but she was way too funny and I find funny to be very sexually attractive, attraction leads to more nudity so I got out of there.
Pinga didn't think it was funny, he was screaming at her so loud his voice became a spitting, high pitched, screech, his nostrils were flared (actually everything on him that flairs was flaring) his eyes were insane looking, he was not looking where he was going plus he was on a bike thats so tall the breaks have to be under the seat, he had one hand between his legs, we all know that no good can ever come of that.. I know nobody has ever seen a nude clown on a tall bike with a pie yelling at a church lady, thats entertainment, so entertaining I started wondering how much trouble I would get into.
By the time I ran over to Mr. Sauce, handed him a pie and ran back, Pinga was screaming at yet another weird lady who was throwing stuff, hot dogs and other flotsam I hear.
She was so angry at the nude dude that I just assumed she hated men no matter how or if they are dressed, Will Workforf Ood noticed that she may have just been angry at her barber because she was sporting a sideways mullet. Pinga told her that this is what he did for a living.
She is the one Pinga was mad at, later he told me he understands a grandmother/church lady type getting sore at him, thats what they do, but the man hater was young enough to know better.
The rest of the crowd(of course) loved it, I don't know who won, I had to call my work because I was at that point an hour and a half late.
It was so hard to leave the Clown House to go to work, I sat on the roof top with a clean, wet diaper quickly rubbing all the clown off my face for work, as I looked down it was frikkin martygras, people all over, congregating and dancing to the sound of loud ass music pouring from all directions, they looked like a mob, they were a mob.
As I sat on the roof, a car stopped and I spied a scuffle, a guy didn't want to wait for the people to get out of his way so he just layed on the car horn, of course thats just a perfect way to start a riot and a few moments later the guy was in the street with a large crowd gathered around him booing.
I was starting to get into a bad mood, I had run a traffic patrol sortie with the fellas earlier and crashed the spin cycle in the street, I did a cartwheel and landed tangled up in my bike, the next day I could hardly move my arm and work was coming up. I was glad that I wouldn't be needing to community police anyone in the face, the fight in the street was someone elses problem.
My mood turned to terror as I noticed that within the epicenter of the brewing riot, I could clearly see Wll, Pinga, Bizzy, Marlyn all Clownhouse teamsters, laughing and dancing around, that could get ugly, I had to leave for my work on 33d and Killingsworth just as the cops were showing up.
The last thing I saw was Pinga and Will yelling into a cop car window, I looked to the dog cart and was relieved to see Heather and Willow helping Chlorine deal with the cart and kids.
I went to work, 20 minutes later I was caught up on dishes, business slowed to a crawl and I had nothing to do but think about the mayhem at home.
I called and Bizzy answered with (as she said) “A face full of soap”, she told me the kids were safe and Chlorine was still out selling dogs.
Marlyn made $70 in her tip hat and Bizzy made seven so we divided it up between the six of us and one share for the house, that's $11 each, the best take on a Thursday event ever. Still a drop in the bucket compared to what we need. Sauce got 5 and the band got eight off the top.
Why did Marylin make so much more?
Skill, she was forceful and relentless is why, people don't really tip much unless they are cornered.
I came home exhausted, thinking the ordeal was almost over but I found my mate Chlorine to be far more sleep deprived and worn out than me (and I had just closed a kitchen) I spent a good amount of time from 4:300 am to 6 dealing with our infant. Chlorine gets up, I lay down in her spot and vice versa. Most of the time my life feels like I'm forever on the clock, I wake up working, work all day, work all night then start my night job. Last Thursday is great because the pressure is kind of off for us, all we gotta do is keep the joint from burning down and make people happy.
We don't really have family (we have relatives who are aware of us but no real family save for the Clown House fam fam) so it's real hard on Chlorine and I and we are both looking forward to the end of the ride. We put out a lot of good stuff here, we spread goodwill, community, fix bikes for free and give away food, we inspire people to turn the tv off and attract lots of people to the neighborhood, we rarely get even a thank you much less support, the best so far has been Zaytoons bar who donate money and prizes for our events they also come out and participate, also I gotta thank Office for donating prizes and all the folks who have been here over the years helping us out with child care and strong backs. And I cant forget Mr. Magnus who once donated $20 but I think he may have been paying me NOT to roll around in a bed of broken glass rather than tipping me for it.
Where will we go next? I tell my people to take lots of photos and remember the sights, smells and sounds of the place that people for many years will be asking them about.
Even if a miracle happens and we get a grant to keep open longer, most of our neighborhood tribe have moved to places that they can afford, the gray spot between poor neighborhood full of crime and homogenized neighborhood full of crapola is over, the jack hammers are now banging away remodeling the apartments that my friends just got evicted from and as the last street fair showed us, Who would want to celebrate a strip of restraunts anyway.