I never really imagined a show about a sponge going past our first season. I thought maybe we'd have a cult following, and we'd be gone after one season.

I thought, well, what about a show that stars undersea creatures, and some of the ones you rarely see animated. So, from there, I just started drawing different animals in a kind of a setting that was this nautical world. It's not realistic but sort of a fantastic environment.

I just kind of figured that the marine biology would be a career, and the art would be something I did for my own self-expression.

One night, I was really beat; we worked really late and went to get food at some takeout place. And I leaned over against this gumball machine, just exhausted, and there was a SpongeBob looking back at me. And it's just, like, 'Oh, brother.'

There was the joke about Switzerland being an island surrounded by land. This was never true.

As for pictures and museums, that don't trouble me. The worst of going abroad is that you've always got to look at things of that sort. To have to do it at home would be beyond a joke.

I consider myself a disciple of Norman Lear. And one of the things he did was topic-driven humor.

It's always been said that comedy comes mostly out of the dark side anyway.