The Einstein Approximation

Season 3 / Episode 14

 

 

What happens when a beautiful mind is almost undone by electrons and graphene sheets? Sheldon has been stuck for over thirty sleepless hours on a physics conundrum. All his efforts to overcome his physicist's block by engaging the superior colliculus have been in vain. Even a torso-twisting two-step in front of his whiteboard hasn't worked, and now he's seeing carbon atoms in everything from Raj's lima beans to marbles on the floor.

 

When a midnight swim in a ball pit also fails to get his pre-frontal juices percolating, Sheldon takes a page out of Albert Einstein's book and decides that menial labor, or, more specifically, "what Penny does" is the key to unlocking his brain. Hiring himself out at The Cheesecake Factory as a busboy/server, Sheldon begins scraping congealed nachos and inventing "zingy" condiments for his friends.

 

Sheldon gets the epiphany he's been waiting for when he drops a tray of dishes and is finally able to visualize the solution to his problem amongst the broken shards and cutlery. "It's a WAVE!!" he shrieks delightedly. Having found where "squatteth the toad of truth" he nonchalantly strolls out of the restaurant, leaving Penny to clean up his mess.

 

by Check E. Light