Ted Cruz is weird, for a human. This is beyond debate. But have you ever sat down and thought about just how freakin' strange he truly is?

Let us count the ways. Consider this The Ultimate Guide to Ted Cruz' Weirdness.

CRUZISMS



Cruz says the darndest things. Here are a few of his crazier quotations:

"By any measure ObamaCare is a far less intimidating foe than those I have discussed (Nazi Germany, Soviet Union, etc.), with the possible exception of the Moon. The Moon might be as intimidating as ObamaCare." Source: Forbes

Weirdness Rating: 6

"Al­ways be sexy," Cruz said on Sept. 25, 2013, quot­ing Ashton Kutcher. "I salute that mes­sage." Source: CBS

Weirdness Rating: 6.5



"When Americans tried it, they discovered they did not like green eggs and ham and they did not like Obamacare either. They did not like Obamacare in a box with a fox, in a house or with a mouse." Source: CBS

Weirdness Rating: 5.5



"When I was solicitor general, I wore a particular pair of boots, my argument boots. They were black ostrich boots…I will embarrassingly admit that I took the coward’s way (for this speech) and wore tennis shoes." Source: Forbes

Weirdness Rating: 7



"If I were in my car and getting ready to reverse, and I saw Donald [Trump] in the backup camera, I'm not confident which pedal I'd push." Source: Jimmy Kimmel Live

Weirdness Rating: 1. Totally normal, actually.



"My music taste changed on 9/11." Source: Politico

Weirdness Rating: 8.5

"If standing for liberty and standing for the Constitution make you a wacko bird, then you can count me a very proud wacko bird." Source: CBS

Weirdness Rating: 9

What's your favorite cereal, Ted?

"Mueslix."

Source: Jimmy Kimmel Live

Weirdness Rating: 10



VIDEO EVIDENCE

There's enough footage documenting Cruz's strangeness to fill a museum someday. Sometimes these motion picture moments capture unexpected absurdities, while others are carefully staged attempts to show Cruz doing Normal Human Things that instead go horribly wrong.

Booger

WARNING: this material may not be suitable for children under the age of 18. Also, don't watch it while eating breakfast, lunch, or dinner.

Weirdness Rating: Off the charts.

Bacon

Cruz wrapped raw bacon around the muzzle of a gun, proceeded to cook said bacon by firing the gun, then ate the bacon off the barrel of a gun... with a plastic fork. "Mmm... machine gun bacon," Cruz says, before letting loose a creepy cackle.

Think this one is maybe not so strange? Watch this Vine mashup, then reevaluate.

Weirdness Rating: 6.5

Ice

To convince us that he is a warm-blooded human, Cruz had himself doused in ice water. He made his own Ice Bucket Snuff Film Challenge video. Fair warning: when that cold H2O hits his dome, Cruz unleashes an animalistic yelp that may summon some sort of malevolent being from the depths of Hell, so be sure to turn your volume down a bit. Also, check out poor Heidi's struggle-face. That bucket looks really heavy.

Want to see that all over again in zoomed-slowmo? Of course you don't, but Gawker's got you covered anyway.

Weirdness Rating: 7.5

Roller Coaster

Here, we see Cruz riding a roller coaster... while wearing a suit.

Many people have compared the ups & downs of a campaign to a roller coaster. Today, we decided to see for ourselves…https://t.co/6NFKsmPKv1 — Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) April 13, 2016

Weirdness Rating: 6



Impressions

It's Ted Cruz, but it's not!

The Simpsons:

The Princess Bride:

Weirdness Rating: 7



B-roll

Thanks to campaign finance laws, Cruz had to release 15 hours of unused campaign commercial footage so his PACs could pick and choose what to use for their ads. The treasure trove of Cruz' awkwardness includes some truly glorious first, second and third takes. For more, check out Politico.

Weirdness Rating: 6

THE BODY OF CRUZ

There's something about Cruz's strange physical makeup that seems to lend itself perfectly to whacky photoshops, conspiracy theories, and scientific analysis. Here, we breakdown the Cruzbod.

Arms and Hands

Ted Cruz is pretty busy running a presidential campaign, so he apparently leaves his arms and hands on "low power mode." As Jezebel expertly compiled in a slideshow available here, Cruz just can't quite get the hang of those pesky appendages.

Weirdness Rating: 8.5

Face

How weird is Cruz' face? Weird enough to prompt a renowned neurologist to search for a scientific explanation for why people love to hate Ted's mug. Writes Richard E. Cytowic, M.D., for Psychology Today:

"His countenance doesn’t move the way I typically expect faces to move. I have rarely, if ever, seen a conventional smile from Senator Cruz. No matter what the emotional coloring of Senator Cruz’s outward rhetoric is, his mouth typically tightens into the same straight line. If it deviates from this, then the corners of his mouth bend down, not upwards. The outside of his eyebrows bend down, too, when he emotes, something so atypical that it disturbs me. And then there is that open “O” of the Senator’s mouth that photos capture over and over. I don’t know what to make of it."

Weirdness Rating: 9



Accoutrement

While his hands and face remain constantly uncovered for all to see, one can only imagine what sort of oddities lay beneath Cruz's baggy, ill-fitting attire. Jezebel again nails it with a slideshow documenting Cruz' unique fashion sense, which can only be described as "lumpy Southwestern un-chic." And for Cruz' immense love of all things cheese, he just couldn't bring himself to don a Wisconsin Cheesehead during his trip to the dairy state ahead of the Republican primary there. Looks like wearing fake cheddar wedges is where he draws the line.

Weirdness Rating: 6.5



COMING OF AGE

Every hero has an origin story. None are as weird as Cruz's.

Canada

Cruz was born north of the border, but he apparently had no idea he was a dual-Canadian citizen until August 2014. So distraught at the prospect of being part Canuck, Cruz "formally" renounced his Canadian citizenship just months after learning of his secret double allegiance.

Weirdness Rating: 5

College

Ted Cruz was weird before he was "Ted Cruz." Even as a 17-year old freshman at Princeton, the man was known for his strangeness, and he made quite an impression on his first-year roommate, Craig Mazin. "I remember very specifically that he had a book in Spanish and the title was Was Karl Marx a Satanist?" Mazin told the Daily Beast of the moment he and Cruz first met. "And I thought, who is this person?" According to the Daily Beast, four of Cruz' classmates interviewed by the news outlet "independently offered the word 'creepy,' with some pointing to Cruz’s habit of donning a paisley bathrobe and walking to the opposite end of their dorm’s hallway where the female students lived."

Also, this:

Ted Cruz thinks people don't have a right to "stimulate their genitals." I was his college roommate. This would be a new belief of his. — Craig Mazin (@clmazin) April 13, 2016

Weirdness Rating: 7.5

CONSUMMATE CRUZ

Let's talk about sex, Ted.

But, please, let's never, ever talk about it ever again ever.

Porn

Remember that time Cruz spent hours watching X-rated videos on the Internet with Sandra Day O'Connor? Cruz does. And he just loves to tell the story.

Weirdness Rating: 10

Rats

While attempting to make it clear that he had no plans to run alongside Donald Trump as veep, Cruz also kinda sorta said he'd have sex with rats. "Let me be clear: Donald Trump may be a rat, but I have no desire to copulate with him," Cruz said in March. So... rats in general, A-OK. But that rat? Pass.

Weirdness Rating: 10,000.

Erotica

Presidential candidate fan-fic erotica is not new, but there's just something about Cruz that makes fake sexy stories about him even more difficult to stomach. The Daily Beast has the scoop on an author's re-imagined XXX-Cruz, rendered way too real in "A Cruzmas Carol."

Warning: So not safe for work. Also, a pantsless Karl Rove makes an appearance.

Weirdness Rating: Vomit bin.

FAMILY MATTERS



Cruz has an adorable and loving family. Seems they kinda think he's a freak, too.

Soup

Here's a tale Heidi told during a CNN town hall, via Gawker:

When I married Ted, we got back from our honeymoon, and he went off to the store and came home by himself. And I was completely shocked to see that he arrived back at our apartment with literally 100 cans of Campbell’s Chunky soup. I never bought 100 of anything. This was shocking to me, so we had a tough conversation about it. I said, “You don’t buy 100 of anything, much less canned soup. We can’t do this. I’ll be making things.” He said, “No, I know you. you won’t be making things.” So the next morning, it was a weekend morning, I loaded up our car before he woke up and returned every single can. And when I got home, I called my mother just to make sure I’d done the right thing as a newlywed. And she emphatically disagreed with me. And so when Ted opened the pantry, I had to quickly tell him that I would go back and buy those cans again.

Weirdness Rating: 100 soup cans.

Kisses

Yeah. Sometimes Cruz' daughter Caroline just really doesn't want to kiss her dad. Here, when Cruz leans in, she tries to flick his face away before recoiling in disgust as soon as his lips make contact.

Weirdness Rating: 6

Patricide

Cruz told Us Weekly that his young daughters' favorite game is "Attack the Daddy," which, according to Cruz, is "more terrifying than you might think." Just last week, 8-year old Caroline appeared to threaten Cruz on live TV during a CNN town hall. Cruz was telling a humanizing story about how he dressed up in a pink boa and wore "big, goofy looking underwear" for a school father-daughter picnic, when Caroline interjected that her father "was on a videotape the whole time," and coldly said that it could be sent out to "all the parents." If Cruz is ever found face-down in the family pool with a pink boa tied around his neck, Caroline has gotta be a prime suspect.

Weirdness Rating: 7

And there you have it: The Ultimate Guide to Ted Cruz' Weirdness. For what it's worth, Cruz seems to have embraced his strangeness, which means we'll probably have a lot to add to this guide over the next few months. As the GOP presidential race heats up, things will only get weirder.

