This is a test. It's only a test.

Or: You can't test stupid.

The Captain was a pretty darn good test taker all through his 17 years of school.  That's right....17.  He wedged in a year to find himself.  He did indeed find himself.  He was on the couch drinking 20 cent bottled beer and mastering Sonic the Hedgehog, but that's another story.  He was a good test taker for one reason and one reason only, he knew it was the only thing that counted towards his grade.  Showing up, paying attention, following direction, working in teams, listening? Optional character building distractions on the path to the Test.

You see, young Captain was stupid.  He had it all backwards.  He'd trade every A or B he ever got for a C or D and a little more knowledge, a little more character building, a little more....well, discipline.  Bad learner, good test taker.  His first and second bosses out of college found out pretty damn quick that he wasn't the best at listening, working in teams or following directions.  Neither boss ever asked or cared what his GPA was in college.  The Captain remembers distinctly the occasion that they each learned he had graduated from college....both instances more than a year after he had started working for them.

Dr. Hermann Rorschach was a bit of a genius.  His inkblot test doesn't let you cram the night before.  It doesn't let you cheat, because it happens NOW.  It's the equivalent of a pop quiz if you didn't know what a pop quiz was.  That my friend is a pop-pop-quiz.  BOOM!  "What's it look like?"  Well, as you can see, sometimes they all look the same, as one of our T-Shirts from this week's new designs proves.

Ok, ok.  Men are pigs.  But back to this week's lesson.

What is the lesson?  What can you possibly glean from the Captain's test taking, Sonic the Hedgehog, beer drinking past?  There isn't one.  Well, maybe one.  Adults were right, they always are on the big stuff.  Stuff that matters.  Stuff you learn through experience.  Stuff you learn too late.  Does he wish he could do it over again?  Nope.  Because for every stupid thing he did when he was stupid, he became a little less stupid now, which means he's not too stupid.  Just stupid enough to be dangerous.  Stupid like a fox.

Dr. Schrodinger's Leg. Smart ain't always smart.

Don't fret, you're probably smarter than a doctor and here's proof.

If you haven't heard of "Schrodinger's Cat" and want to get really confused, check out the wiki entry here.  For our purposes here's all you need to know.

Dr. Schrodinger proposed a thought experiment (relax, it was never actually done) where you put a cat in a box with roughly a 50/50 chance of being killed within one hour by the possible release of poison gas.  The cat is indeed BOTH alive and dead at the end of the hour because the only way to find out is to interfere with the experiment by opening the box.  Sounds legit, huh?  This really makes The Captain's brain hurt like nobody's business.  But thank God for smart people like this guy, it's people like him that figured out how to put images on T-Shirts and build bridges so The Captain can get to work.

The Captain is only interested in two aspects of this experiment:
1)  Putting a cat in a box.
2)  Letting said cat out of box.

It's a known fact that cats have always loved boxes and paper bags.  Scientists have long known that the simple reason for this is because evolution has genetically selected their species to be furry pains in the ass.  It's also a known fact that cats have always not loved being PUT in anything, included their beloved boxes.  No experiment necessary.  Any "putting" anywhere will be done by the cat, not TO the cat.  This has been proven by legions of cat fanciers over the course of history.

Thank you Doc Schrodinger for Captain Leisure Tees new T-Shirt design.

The old doc clearly wasn't a Rhodes Scholar (well, maybe he was).  The Captain ain't sporting booksmarts like the doc, but even he knows these ALL would have been safer choices:

And that concludes The Captain's class on why you are probably smarter than a doctor.  So you can now go on to WebMd and start diagnosing that pesky mole on your back.  The Captain thinks it's a great idea...almost as great as putting a cat in a box.

Next week:  Why you're smarter than your boss.
***spoiler alert*** shortest blog ever.

Those IKEA Swedes are trying to ruin my marriage.

A VERY SPECIAL VALENTINES BLOG
and a very special Valentines T-Shirt:  Nu Dressur.

Hell on Earth

Ok, ok...Maybe "hell" is a little strong.  But is it?  Who's to say what hell is anyway?  Yeah, yeah, The Captain knows the prevailing opinion includes hoofed beasts, lots of fire and pokey metal things, but so does a weekend barbecue, so lighten up.  He's not going to get into all that.  Whatever lights your fire (so to speak) when it comes to otherworldly stuff, he's all for it.  He's talking about a different hell.  You guessed it.  Hell on earth.  Or as The Captain likes to put it: "those IKEA Swedes are trying to ruin my marriage."

See, the Swedes are a diabolical lot bent on psychological torture.  He still hasn't decided if buying or building their crap is worse.  Would you rather burn to death or be eaten alive?  Tough call.  But once The Captain has grabbed his paper ruler and elf sized pencil there's no turning back.  And so begins the endless and mind numbing zig zag zombie furniture walk of death.  A third of the way through he's lost any sense of direction he may have had.  Halfway through he's trying to figure out in case of fire which piece of furniture he can't pronounce is most likely to make it through the inch thick 2nd story window glass.  Two thirds of the way through The Captain wishes he would have listened to all those people who thought he should get his affairs in order "just in case...god forbid something should happen."  "Something's effing happening man!" he quietly yells to the first woman with a double stroller blocking his way to nowhere.  His walking lobotomy now complete, the Swedes will thrust his limp and brainless body through the world's longest point of purchase gauntlet.  "Holy $%@! how come we don't have magnetic spice holders honey? what the hell have we been thinking all these years? spices hanging like bats off our fridge, what do you want to do with the time we're going to save....hey! chip clips!"  By the time he gets home (and his brain cells begin to regenerate) these things all reveal themselves for what they actually are:  Crap.  Hanging crap, magnetic crap, clippy crap, bulk crap and space saving neatly stacking crap.

And it's at this point that the Swedes have you by the umlauts.  See, The Captain sucks really hard at building stuff and won't read directions because they confuse him.  He no like stuff that makes him feel dumb.  Fortunately for Mrs. Captain he'll be bringing to the effort his dehydration, sore feet and a mild case of starvation courtesy of the IKEA Swedes.  This, plus his inability to follow verbal directions and patience of a 3 year old always results in a glowing team effort.

Nu Dressur T-Shirt

But at the end of the day when The Captain and his better half are looking at their new dresser and wondering where that last screw was supposed to go they have some time to reflect.  They're sure that if they can make it through this, they can make it through anything.  This is the exact moment the Swedes true evil plot takes shape.  One of us will look at the other and say "It really wasn't that hard. We could really use a _____."

The free alan wrench?  It's a memory scrubbing device.  Get them out of your house.  Every. Last. One....Now!

Here's one more T-Shirt if you're one of those people that won't let those Swedes or anyone else push you around with their silly assembly instructions.

Assembly Instructions?  You Mean the Manufacturer's Opinion T-Shirt

What do these 3 things have in common?

1) Wiener Dogs 
2) Dr. Seuss 
3) Food Network Cake Challenge 

No, no. This isn't some kind of SAT test. By the way, the Captain didn't study for his and ACED it. And by "aced" he means he stayed awake for a majority of the time. "The Man" isn't going to define the Captain with some arbitrary number. Well, actually "the man" did.  He'll let you guess the number.

Once in a while somebody will ask the Captain "how do you come up with your ideas for funny t-shirts?" His response is always, "wow! you think one is funny? which one? which one?"  Side note:  The Captain doesn't think any of his t-shirts are funny, clever, cute or even marginally amusing.  But that's a different story.  After he tries to get any kind of self esteem boost he can from said person, he then answers "I don't know" and quickly changes the subject. Why? Because he truly doesn't know.  But he does know one thing, we all have tons of useless crap rattling around in our brain cage and sometimes it leaks out our ears... and that brings us back to: Wiener Dogs, Dr. Seuss and Food Network Cake Challenges.... So, try to follow along.

 The Captain's wife decorates cakes.  She did a Food Network Cake Challenge.  The Captain went along.  They have a dog.  They're crazy about their dog.  Her name is Speck.  Speck was the name of Pee Wee's Dog in "Pee Wee's Big Adventure."  The Captain thinks Pee Wee is a genius.  Dr. Seuss is a genius in a different way.  His wife calls herself the "Evil Cake Genius."  The Captain had some Dr. Seuss books as a kid.  He doesn't read books, TV is better.  The Evil Cake Genius was gonna be on TV.  The theme of the Cake Challenge was Dr. Seuss.  His wife did a Green Eggs and Ham cake.  The Captain likes cake.  He also likes his dog.  Dachsunds are a kind of dog.  People call them wiener dogs.  "Wiener dog" sounds funnier than Dachshund.  At the taping of the show he was clockwork oranged on a looped feed of some Dr. Seuss cartoon for 10 hours.  10 hours is a long time.  Wiener dogs are long.  Wieners are funny.  So is Pee Wee.  "Big Top Pee Wee" wasn't as funny as "Big Adventure."  Mmmmm cake.  People are crazy about cake.  People are crazy about wiener dogs.  People are crazy about Dr. Seuss.  Paul Reubens is just plain crazy.  People buy shirts for stuff they're crazy about.  Can't license Pee Wee.

So the Captain decided to do some t-shirts for cake decorators and some t-shirts for dachshund owners.

So you want to know how you can come up with some t-shirt ideas?  Just keep living and once in a while tilt your head to one side....what leaks out of your ear might surprise you.

Evil Cake Genius T-Shirt

See More T-Shirts for Cake Decorators

One Wiener Two Wiener Red Wiener Blue Wiener T-Shirt

 See More T-Shirts for Dachshund Lovers

Watch Pee Wee greet Speck in the morning!

Watch the Dr. Seuss Food Network Challenge

Check out The Captain's wife's website...she's awesome.