Hazel and I had a lovely evening at the Knavesmire in York. It’s a special place for us as we were married in York Minster. I had been booked as an after dinner speaker and had been asked to give a talk and demonstration as Chuckle The Clown. There were about two hundred people in attendance and we enjoyed a first class meal. The food was delicious and the service was excellent. After the meal there were a few short speeches and a couple of presentations, then a comfort break before I was on. I was given an excellent introduction which explained who I was and all about my back ground and business.

My talk was in three parts.

I began with Punch and Judy as this was how I started out. I did the story about swallowing the swazzle and how it turned up again when I was in the loo. I then got onto clowning and how I went to the USA to learn the basics.

Next I had a couple of guys hold up a screen whilst I changed into my clown costume. Then a make up demonstration resulting in me in full clown slap. After this I showed off a few props and had a few folk out to try their hand.

The last part was audience participation under the pretext of a clowning masterclass. We did feather balancing, musical chairs, a clown band, marshmallow eating and as the grand finale, a custard pie demo. Unfortunately this went terribly wrong and the only one who got pied was me, several times! ( or perhaps this was the plan? )

We ended up with a mass clown dance before I took a bow and retired.

It was all great fun and I had loads of very positive feedback afterwards. It seems that most people really enjoyed themselves.

Hazel and I were the last to leave as we had lots of people coming up to talk to us so we couldn’t pack up until they’d all gone.

A very good night, though late home, after 1am.