Slinking with a reptilian gait across the floor of his parents’ basement, his face and torso painted with his mother’s lipstick, 39-year-old Travis Clarke recently re-enacted professional wrestler Finn Bálor’s entrance, to the indifferent bemusement of his cats. 

“This is awesome!” Clarke’s cats, Tinkerbell and Trixie, did not chant. “This is awesome!”

Clarke has been a “die-hard fan of Bálor’s for years” (since 2016, according to acquaintances), and is enamoured with the enigmatic Irishman’s eye-catching entrances and body-paint. 

Though he has not ascended from his parents’ basement in weeks, Clarke claims he has “a lot in common” with the athletic and charismatic Bálor, whom he outweighs by 273 pounds and outsmells by a country mile. 

Clarke has memorized every movement of Bálor’s famous entrances, from the Rastafarian hairpiece (a ball of yarn borrowed from his mother’s sewing kit) to the dramatic outward thrusting of his arms, which frightened Trixie and caused her to hide under Clarke’s bed. 

Clarke has been “working really hard” on his re-enactment of Shinsuke Nakamura’s entrance, and recently bought a red leather ensemble from a local sex shop, which Tinkerbell promptly urinated upon.