Episode 13, Revenge of the Nerds

If the shows you've been watching don't cover such diverse topics as ComicCon, Differential Equations, the Mambo & Bartending, then you should add The Big Bang Theory (Mondays on CBS) and Beauty & The Geek (Tuesdays on CW) to your repertoire.

Beauty & The Geek is nearing the season finale, so tune in quick! If you're not familiar with the show the premise is basic: an attractive, not-so-bright, 20-something is matched with a not-so-attractive, genius, 20-something for a series of competitions to help the pair grow socially, emotionally & perhaps even academically. The team that grows the most (or just doesn't get eliminated) wins $250k. Of course the beauties have weekly challenges around learning something nerdy like geography, biology or developing an original comic book hero while the geeks learn something social like sewing (a comic book hero costume), massage or bartending.

My favorite this season has been the uber-geek Joshua. If you searched wikipedia for "geek", I have little doubt Joshua's bio will appear (give it a try and let me know how it works out...if you don't have success click on his CW bio here!) Through all the crazy challenges Joshua has given it his all, but none quite captured his sense of daring, athleticism and surprising lack of understanding of basic physics as his go at flair bartending:

• Imagine an attractive lady asks for a pina colada. Joshua is pleased because that is the drink he's been studying.
  
• He grabs the rum, gives it a flip, a twist, spills no more than a tablespoon and lands about 1/2 oz of rum in the shaker.
  
• Then he goes for the glass carafe of cream: you can see his mind turning as he thinks about how to flip and catch this very full container. Not willing to risk a shattered bottle of cream and have nothing to mix in the pina colada (like say, maybe coconut milk?) Joshua decides to put gravity to work for him. With a firm grip on the carafe, he pops it into the air and quickly moves the open shaker under the cream as it falls back to earth at 32.2 ft/sec^2. More cream is needed, so Joshua follows-up quickly with a second thrown-cream, gravity-catch (watch out, this will be all the rage with championship flair-tenders next season!)
  
• Now for the ice...the gravity move seemed to work well, and after a couple tong tosses of ice up, about 4 come down in the shaker.
• Once the drink is in the old fashioned glass (that's what I drink my pina coladas out of, don't you?!) and a straw is needed, so Joshua reverts to his tried and true gravity-catch. 10 straws go up, all come down, but none in the glass. On the second try, 4 go up, and two land in the glass and Joshua presents his lovely partner with a 2 oz rum & cream drink.
  

Please, don't be confused...I am not poking fun at Joshua (well, maybe at little at his over-use of gravity.) He gave it his all, made me laugh so hard i almost cried and he had a good time trying something new. Like one of the competing Beauties said "he can make me a drink anytime!" Sadly, Joshua & his Beauty were eliminated last week, and I'm not sure the show will be the same without him.

This is where The Big Bang Theory comes in. It mimics reality (the reality show, that is) with 2 main geeks, Leonard & Sheldon, who are physicists, like Joshua. Their two nerdy friends, Howard & Rajesh, one of which can't talk to girls unless his is drunk. And their cute waitress/bartender friend, Penny, who lives across the hall. It also mimics my reality since I went to a college where ~75% of the population could easily be Leonard, Sheldon, Howard or Joshua and the other ~25% were more like Rajesh. Of course Leonard would love to have a relationship with Penny and the show smartly delivers the humor that can be found between the academic & social haves and have-nots. My favorite moments from this season are, in no particular order:

1. When Howard poses as Rajesh in a phone conversation with a would-be date in an over-the-top Indian accent that results in Rajesh admonishing Howard for making him "sound like a convenience store clerk on The Simpson's."
2. When Sheldon dresses as the Doppler Effect for Halloween and everyone thinks he's a zebra.
3. Any of their crazy food antics: how to split 4 dumplings between 3 people, describing how long cereal can sit in milk before it ruins your Saturday morning routine or whether its alright to have Thai for dinner after having Indian for lunch (FYI, its not ok.)

The good news is that CBS seems to be re-airing the season at its regularly scheduled time (I caught the Pilot episode again tonight-Leonard & Penny's kids would be smart, beautiful, and imaginary!) You can also catch them on CBS's website. I need a healthy dose of nerd humor in my TV schedule, so please start watching and keep my hopes alive that The Big Bang Theory will survive the writers' strike!

The Queen has spoken!