I acknowledge and respect your lack of applause. No, I do. I truly do. Though it can be heartwarming to receive recognition from your peers, in a world full of nothing but disappointment, it would only serve to cause more harm than good. There’s nothing more disheartening than crushed hope, or a dream deferred, dried up like some sort of fruit snack in the sun.

I, of course, am Morosey, the saddest Pop Star in Britain. I write the songs that make the whole world weep openly. I singlehandedly bummed out the Johnson County Fair, I brought a thirteen year-old girl overdosing on Prozac back to the brink of despair, I was once advised to cheer up by the ghost of Franz Kafka. You may be familiar with my hit songs, “Not Enough Tear Ducts in My Face,” “Everyone’s Just Not That Into You,” and “Qualified to Saddify You,” which have led me to be dubbed the Duke of Despondence, Master of Melancholia, and The Fozzie Bear of Forlorn. And I have won numerous awards, which are ultimately meaningless in the void that is existence, except that none of you have won them, so there.

But tonight is not about me. No, this evening the annual Why Don’t You Care-aoke and Cry Jag is a benefit for those misunderstood creatures, the Pterodactyls. As a misunderstood creature myself, I’m filled with nothing but sympathy, aside from despair, ennui and cabernet sauvignon. In honor of these noble winged dinosaurs, I’ve composed a poem which I shall now perform for you, accompanied only by a lonely arrangement and depressingly dramatic poses. It is entitled, “Save the Pterodactyls (I’m No Longer Worth the Effort.)” (Music starts.) My face has never known the shape of a smile/ I believe I’ll wallow in that thought for a while/ I can no longer tell the difference twixt a laugh and a lie/ If my heart were not beating then surely I would die/ And be objectified by judgmental morticians./ These lines that I recite, no they’re not even mine/ I looked within my soul and I plagiarized/ If I fall in the woods then nobody cares/ They’re too busy debating the fecal habits of bears there/ The only important movements are those of the bowel./ Save the pterodactyls. Save the pterodactyls/ Please, save the pterodactyls, I’m no, no longer worth the effort./ Oh, my invisible friend, his name is Despair/ He’s a lot like me but with much worse hair/ We spend evenings together under a blanket of grief/ And Joaquin Phoenix’s name used to be Leaf/ I’ve always wondered why he changed that./ You abandoned me in a wintry hour/ My face folded in like the opposite of a flower/ You said you were looking for someone less gloomy/ Like an argyle sock, you were trying to shoe me/ Even I am unsure what I mean by that./ Save the pterodactyls. Save the pterodactyls/ Please, save the pterodactyls, I’m no longer worth the effort./ And even though I’m irredeemably sad/ You still try to find a way to redeem me/ Like an empty bottle of grape soda/ You know so well how to low self-esteem me/ Save the pterodactyls. Save the pterodactyls/ Please, save the pterodactyls, I’m no, no not no longer worth the effort./ And I would try, except that I’m just too shy. (Music ends.) Thank you, thank you. Your applause is like an auditory cocktail shaker, mixing my emotions. I must go now, but remember to think about what I’ve done, and what you haven’t done. And save the pterodactyls. Thank you.