Learning weirdly, in 3-D

Is the brain the No. 1 food source for zombies? Does it taste like chicken?

Who knows? Well, maybe Weird Al Yankovic.

In a 15-minute window to what learning might be like if Weird Al were a professor, kids and adults at the Orange County Fair have been bombarded with 3-D images and facts of the brain through the celebrity’s trademark-styled songs.

The tent housing Weird Al’s manic lesson on the brain and all it can do looks more like the entrance to a haunted house or maze than a doorway into a science lesson.

But inside, that’s exactly what thousands have been getting since the fair began last month.

“It was funny and educational,” said Brian Azevedo, from Anaheim. Azevedo and his kids were among a group of about 100 people who checked out the show in the late afternoon.

“I’m a health science major so I really liked it,” said Amy Salazar, who took her sons to check out the show.

The introductory movie is equal to a comedian warming up a crowd and got as many laughs. An animated brain tells the audience that the brain requires 20 hours of sleep a day and is useful for spanking bunnies.

Apparently, it also tastes like chicken.

From there, the group is herded into the theater where most of the project’s $2.5 million likely went. The 3-D effects gross out the crowd when Weird Al squeezes the brain like a sponge, and later send everyone into a frenzy when he journeys them into the inner-ear. Guests also laughed when celebrities the likes of Fabio asked if it’s true that we only use 10% of our brain. The answer is yes, but only for Fabio, Weird Al said. The rest of use all of it, and certainly did during the grand finale, a song about the brain.

In classic Weird Al-style, he closes out the show with a song, one so jam-packed with facts about neurons, dendrites and lobes that most could probably past your basic brain anatomy test afterward.

“It was funny!” said Jared Kaleikini, 11, from Westminster. Jared and his brother liked the warm-up video at the beginning the best, especially when it joked about removing the brain from the body with old 1950s film clips.

For more photos, click here.

Things To Do

Ready to rock

See one of the storied bands from the classic rock era in the 1960s, Three Dog Night, perform at 8 p.m. in the Pacific Amphitheatre.

Get your fried foods

Today is your last chance to enjoy all the fried-bliss the Orange County Fair can offer from deep-fried Twinkies and Oreos to zucchini.

Eating contest

At Ralphs Family Fair Way, watch people gorge themselves to their full potential in this daily food eating contest at 6:30 p.m.

They Said It

“I liked the taking-off-the-mom’s-head part, it was funny.”

Jared Kaleikini, 11

Westminster