gorilla instinct

my first instinct, every time i see a real gorilla, is to assume it's a guy in a really good gorilla suit before it dawns on me that i'm at the zoo, at the ape part, and this is probably real.

2011: year of the dream cars

yes sir, 2011 is going to be a good year. i know this because my 2011 calendar is themed "dream cars." there's a picture of a weird futuristic "concept car" for each month. i remember going to some expo when i was a kid where they showed off cars like this.  all the cars looked like they came from the Back to the Future II set. i remember there was one that didn't have windshield wipers and my brother joe asked the guy why that was so. i remember the guy looking as if he had never noticed the lack of windshield wipers. then he said, "that's, uh, because, um, you drive it so fast, the rain just flies off of it. and i remember that, even as a kid, i could tell that was a made-up answer.
yes sir, 2011 is going to be a good year.

what kind of animal is this?

what kind of animal is this? i can't remember its name.

hint: it's from new zealand, i think.

syndication

I can't figure out why some shows get re-run all the time and others don't. According to Jim is on all the time, yet I can't tell you the last time I saw an episode of Perfect Strangers.

animal race stereotypes

i've seen a lot of white tigers and white lions, but are there white versions of every animal? and if so, do those animals get hassled less by the authorities than the animals of color? do they have a harder time dancing? do animals dance? i think owls do. or is that just movie magic? i have a lot of questions about this kind of stuff.

those are comedies?

I just saw a television commercial for that new movie "Morning Glory" and one of the reviews called it "the funniest comedy since The Devil Wears Prada."

I'm genuinely confused.

there will be mating

my friend kienan found a note on the sidewalk that said, "White lions, are not allowed in allen county, keep them in a cage with their natural surrounding, feed them rodents dead/live animals, keep people from coming close to cage, there will be mating."

i have so many questions for whoever wrote this: why so many commas? isn't some of this common sense? what are rodents dead/alive animals? do we need to keep people from coming close to the cage because the white lions will mate with them? or because the lions will be mating with each other and that might offend people? or are those last two notes unrelated?

TNT: nancy bush

Good news! Nancy Reagan was recently spotted at a gala wearing a Schoolpants button on her lapel! In other schoolpants news, That's Not That may be staging a comeback.

canada

that's it. i'm moving to canada.

electromagnetic fields, duh

i consider myself a relatively not-un-educated person, yet when it comes to seemingly simple devices like "compasses," i feel like i'm from the middle ages. i can't explain how they work. it's just this weird magic thing about our planet. i guess there is some invisible force that pulls metal to the north? that sounds goofy. why haven't all the metal things been pulled up to the north pole by now? i don't get it.

magic tricks

I want to apologize for not blogging everyday lately. My life has become exponentially busier in recent weeks due to my enrollment in the Highly Imaginative Magic Tricks School of Magic. The quantity of Schoolpants posts has suffered, but I assure you, friend, that my highly imaginative magic tricks have not.

The HIMT school of magic is owned and operated by Rufus Cartweild, certified magician and CEO of Magic Hat Accessories LLC. I had the great fortune of bumping into Mr. Cartweild (quite literally) in a shopping mall in Burbank, Calif. I was fumbling with a half dozen or so bags from Hot Topic in an effort to dab my cargo shorts with a damp napkin to remove some freshly spilled Orange Julius before the stain set in. Had I been watching where I was going, I might not've run smack into Mr. Cartweild's magic display, toppling his tower of magic rabit-skin hats.

I prepared for a fight to ensue but Mr. Cartweild was nothing but friendly. Rather than stop the magic display for a rumble with me, he decided to generously incorporate me into the show. "My school for highly imaginative tricks is so effective," he proclaimed, "that even a buffoon such as this could be a magic man in a matter of mere weeks."

Anyway, long story short, he gave me a partial scholarship and even helped me fill out the paperwork at the bank to get a substantial loan to pay for the rest of the tuition. Now I'm living in his basement and training full-time. He's pretty strict. I only get 14 minutes of internet time a day, which is why the blog posts have been a bit lacking. But if I stay on top of my chores and don't make any more mistakes, I should get more internet time next week. And before we know it, I'll be a performing highly imaginative magic tricks and wowing my peers!

dern ducks

wouldn't it be awesome if ducks were all over the place the way squirrels and pigeons and stuff are? not that i don't like squirrels and pigeons and stuff, but wouldn't it be funny? you walk through the park or whatever and there's just a bunch of ducks running around. up trees and whatnot. you're in the city and there are ducks everywhere, standing in your way until you almost step right on them? or you go to the beach and there are ducks everywhere, trying to eat your beach snacks. or out in the country, farmers have to put up scareducks to keep all the ducks from eating their corn? anyway, i'd like it.

silly hair roommates

my roommates like to goof around with silly hairdos.

huge toilet

look at the size of this toilet! it makes that normal-sized trashcan look TINY!

My Best Friend, My Butler, My Halloween

Finally, a new episode of everyone's favorite sitcom classic, "My Best Friend, My Butler." The boys are back and this time it's spooky. If you need a refresher course on Butler, watch the pilot here. If you're ready to see the newest freshest episode look below. Warning: Not for the faint of heart. Very spooky.

halloween is weird

for a lot of reasons.

yes, but

what is yummly? should i not be eating that?

normal groceries

i just got home from a night trip to the grocery store. i went there after work because i needed supplies. i've been editing a video that i would like to finish by tomorrow. that involves sleep deprivation. and sleep deprivation makes your body sick. somebody told me if you think you're getting sick, you should eat a garlic. i don't know if it works but i do know this: a garlic only costs fifty cents.

also, we're having friends over tomorrow, so i bought some cheap vodka. also, 5 hour energy drinks and power bars are great for staying awake. also, cocoa pebbles were on sale.

the point of my story is this: i was waiting in the checkout lane, realizing that i was buying $39 worth of energy, booze, and garlic and realizing that makes me look like a lunatic. also, i had to pee really bad, which made me fidget around A LOT. so, when the clerk eyed me and my items warily, i gave her a blank stare and said "vampire stakeout." she nodded and accepted my payment.

irish wristwatch

my favorite tongue twister is "irish wristwatch." i like it so much because it's small and it doesn't seem like a tongue twister. but say it three times fast. it is a tongue twister.

when i was twenty, i spent a semester in ireland. at that time in my life, for whatever reason, i thought it was important to wear a wristwatch. i never had when i was younger, but i felt like it was a grownup thing to do. but i NEVER remembered to look at it to see what time it was. occasionally, i would still say things like, "what time is it?" and more often than not, i just wouldn't even think to consider what time it was.

also at that time in my life, i only wore colors like "brown," and "dark yellow."

the thing about pumpkins

 The thing about pumpkins is: some are giant and some are tiny, yet all would be unpopular if weren't for Halloween.

scary pirates

i bet back in the time of pirates, people were really scared of pirates on account of all the raping and pillaging they'd do. but i see pirates differently. i think a lot of them were exotic bird owners. and, to me, that's what makes them so creepy.

kienan birthday

today is my friend kienan's birthday. he is 438 space-years old today. i met kienan when i was fifteen earth-years old. around that time, i had gotten into the habit of going out to amish farms and dressing their animals up in modern clothing in the middle of the night. they'd wake up to find their horses, cows, and chickens decked out in denim, zippers, and buttons. they didn't know how to react.

anyway, i was out late one night, hanging a mirror in the stable and putting newspaper clippings of Mr Ed sort of sticking out of the frame of the mirror to make it look like this one horse was a huge Mr Ed fan and maybe he was practicing talking in front of the mirror, hoping to be the next horse to make it big in hollywood. suddenly, i heard a strange noise. it didn't sound like an amish noise. it sounded like a futuristic noise. so i left the stable to try to figure out what the heck was going on. that's when i saw him. an astronaut flying down to earth on what looked like a jet ski with flames shooting out the back. "awesome," i whispered to myself. "darn right it's awesome," shouted the astronaut as he turned of the engine and removed his helmet.
"are you a ghost?" i asked.
"no, dummy, i'm a spaceman," he replied.
"spaceman! that's what i meant. not ghost. i meant to say spaceman," i insisted.
"well then, right you are! my name's kienan!"
we high fived three times in a row, real fast.
i introduced myself, "my name's nic michaels"
"cool," he said.
"thanks," i said.
we spent the rest of the night eating astronaut ice cream and putting bifocals on pigs. we've been best friends ever since. happy birthday, friend!

simulation bread

my friend eva went to china recently for the world's fair. she brought back toys for everyone. i got some "simulation bread." it's a little key chain or something? and it looks like a dinner roll. it looks really real. but it came in a bag that warned, "Aphorism: This bread is the simulation bread, forbids edible!"

i think stuff like that is hilarious.

i'm havin' a ball

sometimes i worry that i'm a pessimist. or i worry that i get down on myself too much. or maybe i just have a rotten attitude about things. but then sometimes, at 10 am on a tuesday-day-off, i decide to cook these frozen boneless buffallo wings that actually just look like little red meatballs. and while they're cooking, i decide to leave the house with the oven on so i can run to the market to get a mexican coke. and along the way i see a homeless man pooping by a bush. and i get back to the apartment and the timer has already gone off and my roommate looks concerned. and i think, "i bet a lot of people my age would think of this as a pretty pathetic morning," but not me. i feel great because this morning is hilarious. and then i realize, "see, i'm a happy guy!"

time to get a haircut

i look like a bearded lady.

tim hank

i think it's funny when you use a search engine and then it asks you if you meant something stupider than what you actually asked for. like last night, i was looking for this hilarious movie i made about actor/comedienne, tim hank, in which i cleverly edited tom hanks to make it sound like he said, "hello, i'm tim hank." i was very proud of this editing trick. anyway, i searched "tim hank" in youtube and it found my video but it also asked me, "did you mean tom hank?"

it's funny because tom hank is also not a person.

new computer!

i finally got a new computer! it has a camera in it so i can finally take pictures of myself in the bathroom!

foosball

i love foosball. growing up, we had a foosball table in my basement. when i was around twelve, i decided i was going to practice a lot and get really good at foosball and then i would just be that guy who is awesome at foosball. i imagined myself in my twenties being really cool and being at a bar with all my really cool friends and there'd be a foosball table at this particular bar. inevitably, someone would say something like, "oh hey, they have a foosball table! anybody want to play?" and i would very nonchalantly say, "sure. i'll play." and then everyone would discover that i was secretly the best foosball player in the history of the world.

but i didn't stick with it. i mean, how do you "practice" foosball? it was a stupid idea.

netflix is being condescending

so i finally splurged and got a netflix subscription. so far, my favorite part of having it is rating movies. if you've never used it, here's how it works: it asks you to rate movies or let them know if you haven't seen movies. so like Tommy Boy will show up and you click five stars because that movie's a classic and then it'll ask how often you watch slapstick movies like Tommy Boy and you say sometimes because you don't want to say often because that's not entirely true.

but then Back to the Future showed up. it's one of my all time favorite movies, so i was excited and proud to check five stars and i was prepared for it to ask me how often i watch awesome movies like Back to the Future and i was going to say often. but then netflix DIDN'T ask how often i watch awesome movies like B to the F. netflix asked me how often i watch movies for ages 11 to 12 like B to the F.

screw you, netflix. ... i did click "often," though.

avocado festival

last weekend, i went to the california avocado festival. it was awesome. i got to ride on a trolley. i ate a ton of guacamole. i drank avocado honey beer. i saw smokey the bear. i ate an awesome cheeseburger at a place that didn't allow animals unless they were birds. and i fell asleep in the car on the way home. it was maybe the best day of my life.

maybe the best picture ever

i can't get over how funny everything about this is. my friend adam showed it to me and i laughed a bunch and said i liked the guy with the cigar. he told me that guy is a meme. i didn't know what that word meant, so i looked it up.

and now i know something that i didn't know yesterday. apparently everyday is supposed to be like that.