'Double Rainbow' Guy Paul 'Yosemite Bear' Vasquez Was Sober ... This Time
Viral video maker Paul Vasquez says he was "on pure rainbow power," not drugs.
July 10, 2010 — -- "Oh my God, it's a double complete rainbow in my front yard!," Paul Vasquez said, while video-taping the latest viral Web sensation. "It's too much! I don't know what it means!"
Vasquez's ecstatic, sobbing reaction to seeing a "double rainbow" proves it was an intense experience.
And now we know it was NOT herbally influenced.
"I was just on pure rainbow power," he told ABC News' "Good Morning America." "I was by myself, and it was just the spirit of the universe influencing me."
The "Double Rainbow" viral video sensation is a three-and-a-half-minute emotional journey. Vasquez's initially innocent surprise at discovering two rainbows outside his Yosemite, California, home erupts into moaning fits of ecstasy and then breaks down into sobs of existential wonderment.
His baffling, hilariously over-the-top response has caused almost all viewers of the video to speculate: Is that guy high?
"Look me in the Skype and tell me you were sober when you shot this?" "Good Morning America" host Bill Weir pressed Vasquez in an interview via Skype.
"I'm a pretty happy guy," Vasquez admits. "I mean, there's some other videos on my YouTube page where I was a little high, but not that one."
Vasquez, who sometimes goes by the name "Yosemite Bear," previously drove trucks long-haul, trained as a cage fighter and now operates his own farm, according to an interview he previously gave to the website Urlesque. He has uploaded more than 250 videos to his YouTube channel, Huggybear9562, but he knew that this rainbow video was different.
'Double Rainbow' Guy: 'I Knew It Was Pretty Amazing'
He was right. "Double Rainbow" has taken the Internet by storm, already surpassing 2.5 million views on YouTube. It has inspired countless dance remixes, mashups -- including one with Kermit the Frog -- and parodies from fans who have tapped into their own sources of pure rainbow power.
"When I shot the video, I knew it was pretty amazing," he told "GMA." "I always thought there was something special going on."