He may not be able to contort his body to fit into a roller-backpack, and he can’t dislocate his shoulder, but the tricks that sophomore Brad Antognini does are simply crazy.

“Most of the stuff I do is because of my brother; he got all the [toys] and I eventually decided I’d learn how to do [the tricks],” he said.

Joe, Brad’s brother, now attends California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, and still works on unusual tricks.

“I’m working on contact-juggling at the moment,” Joe said. This is where a person keeps the ball touching his body at all times in continuous motion so that it’s rolling all over him.

Brad recalls the Christmas when he was 10, when Joe received his first of many unique toys: a diabolo.

Evolving from the Chinese yo-yo, this toy is essentially a juggling prop, consisting of a spool that is spun on a string tied to two sticks held in each hand.

“Literally that [Christmas] night, I stayed up all night to learn how to do [the diabolo],” Brad said.

During high school, he has broadened his library of tricks with the diabolo. Now he can throw the spool up as high in the air as he wants and catch it without faltering on the way down.

In addition, Brad can do over-orbits—making the spool travel in a circular motion around his leg by throwing it over one leg and catching it on the other side.

After that Christmas, his obsession with unique toys and tricks grew; he extended his arsenal to include juggling, memorizing digits of the number pi, and many others.

“I can juggle four balls. Tricks I can do with three [balls] include juggling behind my back, and catching one of the balls on my neck [with my back parallel to the ground],” he said.

In regards to memorizing pi, Brad recalls that his brother also introduced him to this unusual trick of sorts.

“[I memorized] far too many digits—around 300 would be a good guess,” Joe said chuckling.

This paved the way for Brad during middle and high school, as he is now up to 70 digits.

But that’s not the end of Antognini’s trick collection; he can also toss around a toy called the double-sticks.

Double-sticks are rubber-coated batons, which are used to juggle a third stick in between the two. He can throw them up in the air and juggle them around his legs.

In addition, he can spin ceramic plates in the air on top of long, thin wooden sticks with no fear.

Continuing to push for newer and more difficult stunts, the newest addition to this trick connoisseur’s collection is the unicycle.

“Unicycling is probably the hardest trick because you use your entire body. It gets very tiring very quickly,” he said.

Antognini isn’t entirely sure of where this unique hobby will take him, as he’s pretty sure that he won’t end up being a “carny” in the Cirque du Soleil. However, in the near future he may perform for children’s birthday parties for a little extra cash.

For those with little siblings, Antognini would make a birthday party much more exciting.