"Knight to Queen's Bishop 5." "Ah." "Very nice." "What's Leonard gonna do?" "Does he give up the pawn or give up the position?" "Mm." "Let's find out." "Leonard, ready?" "Ready." "Go." "Damn it." "I slipped." "Too bad." "You know the rules of Secret Agent Laser Obstacle Chess." "Leonard died again, Sheldon." "You're up." "Despite my deep love of chess, lasers and aerosol disinfectant I must forfeit." " Why?" " Because it's almost 11:00." " So?" " So Penny has a "Don't knock on my door before 11:00 or I punch you in the throat" rule." "Ah." "Hey, you know what would be a great idea?" "We get some girls over here and play Laser Obstacle Strip Chess." "Believe me, any girl willing to play that, you don't wanna see naked." "You underestimate me." "Penny." "Penny." "Penny." "Hey, Sheldon." " It's 11 a.m." " I know." "You're safe." "This package came while you were at work." "Great, my rhinestones." "Thank you." " Excuse me." " What?" "You have to sign this." "What is it?" "When I signed for the package, I was deputized by the United Parcel Service and entrusted with its final delivery." "I need you to acknowledge receipt so that I'm fully indemnified and no longer liable." "Sheldon, it's just a box of rhinestones." "Contents are irrelevant." "A legal bailment has been created." "Does that mean nothing to you?" "It means nothing to anybody." " Let me show you what I'm doing." " Bailment describes a relationship in common law where a physical possession of personal property, or chattels is transferred from one person, the bailer, to another person, the bailee." "Yeah, yeah." "Look, look." "I started a business." "Obviously not a cleaning business." "No." "I'm making flower barrettes." "See?" "I call them Penny Blossoms." "I made one for myself." "All the girls at work wanted one." "I showed some to this lady who runs a shop." "She sells cards and jewelry." "She wanted to sell them, I said okay, and in one week, I made a $ 156." "Good for you." "Sign here." "Sheldon, don't you get it?" "If this takes off, I won't have to be a waitress anymore." "But then who will bring me my cheeseburger on Tuesday nights?" "Another waitress?" " What's her name?" " I don't know." "And you're going to let her handle my food?" "Nancy." "Her name is Nancy." "I think you're just making that up." "Sheldon, I'm sorry about your hamburger, okay?" "I just don't wanna be a waitress." "Cheeseburger." "I get a cheeseburger." " Fine." "Cheeseburger." " Maybe I'd be better off with Nancy." "So, what do you think?" "I mean, this could be a business, right?" " How many of these can you make a day?" " Mm." "About 20." "And how much profit do you make per Penny Blossom?" " I don't know." "Like, 50 cents." "I'm not sure." " No, of course you're not." "All right." "Ten dollars a day times five days a week times 52 weeks a year is $2600." " That's all?" " Before taxes." "Well, I don't have to pay taxes on this stuff." "The Internal Revenue Service would strongly disagree." "But if you took advantage of modern marketing techniques and optimized your manufacturing process you might make this a viable business." "And you know about that stuff?" "Penny." "I'm a physicist." "I have a working knowledge of the entire universe and everything it contains." "Who's Radiohead?" "I have a working knowledge of the important things in the universe." " Good luck." " Sheldon, hold on." "Could you maybe show me how to make more money with this?" "Of course I could." "Sheldon, wait." "Will you?" "Just to be clear here." "You're asking for my assistance." "Yes." "And you understand that will involve me telling you what to do?" "I understand." "And you're not allowed to be sarcastic or snide to me while I'm doing so." "Okay." "Good." "Let's begin with the premise that everything you've done up to this point is wrong." " Oh, imagine that." " Sarcasm." "Goodbye." "No, I'm sorry." "Wait." "Please, come back." " There." "Done." " All right." "Twelve minutes and 17 seconds." "Oh, pretty good, right?" "That's 4.9 Penny Blossoms per hour." "Based on your cost of materials and your wholesale selling price you'll effectively be paying yourself $5.19 a day." "A day?" "There are children in a sneaker factory in Indonesia who out-earn you." "That just can't be right." " You're questioning my math?" " No, sorry." " Would you like me to show my work?" " God, no, no." " Just please tell me what to do about it." " All right." "Are you familiar with the development that resulted from Honoré Blanc's 1778 use of interchangeable parts?" "The assembly line, of course." "Okay, if I'm not allowed to be snide, you're not allowed to be condescending." "That wasn't a part of our original agreement and I do not agree to it now." "How are we supposed to set up machines and conveyor belts in my apartment?" "You're thinking of the moving assembly line." "An understandable, but not excusable, mistake." "Now the moving assembly line, that was introduced by Henry Ford in 1908." "That innovation is what made possible our modern consumer culture by enabling a low unit cost for manufactured goods." "I guess that isn't one of the topics discussed on your Radiohead." "Let's go." "We're going to miss the coming attractions." "What's the matter?" "I think I bruised a testicle capturing that last pawn." "Hello?" "Hello." "What's going on?" "I assume you're referring to the sea shanty." "It's a rhythmic work song to increase productivity." "Yeah." "It's crazy, but it works." "Look, we made this Penny Blossom in under three minutes." "Terrific, but that kind of raises more questions than it answers." "Penny's making hair accessories." "I'm helping her optimize her manufacturing process." "All right, break's over." " What are you using as a bonding agent?" " Hot glue." "You're kidding." "Any of the cyanoacrylates would do a better job." " Won't work." "The flower's porous." " What if we infused the bottom layer with silicone RTV to provide a better mounting surface?" "Intriguing." "What are your marketing and distribution channels?" "The waitresses at my work, and this cute shop" "Hush, hush, hush." "Virtually nonexistent." "I'm thinking that we set her up with a hosted turnkey e-commerce system to start." "Eliminate the middle man." "A small server farm with a static IP in her bedroom." " She'll need some kind of cooling system." " Of course." "But before we set up a marketing infrastructure we should finish optimizing the manufacturing process." "She has a terrible problem with moisture-induced glitter clump." "Yeah, it's a bitch." "I've seen this before." " Where?" " It's a common stripper problem." "They dance, they sweat, they clump." "Thinking about adding a desiccant like calcium sulfate?" "Actually, I'm thinking about this one stripper named Vega." "But, sure, calcium sulfate could work." "Let's think out of the box for a moment." "How about a molecular sieve?" "Oh." "I've got a spaghetti strainer in the kitchen." "Wow." "Hey, we could liberate some microporous charcoal from the chem lab." "Oh, great." "Raj, why don't you go get the charcoal?" "Leonard, start working on some preliminary website designs." "I'll make space in our apartment so we can move the manufacturing process." " Well, what's wrong with my apartment?" " It's not my apartment." "Wait, wait, what am I gonna do?" "Hey, it's your business." "Do whatever you want." "Oh." "Okay." "Cool." "I'm gonna take a nap." "I'm still tweaking things a little bit, but this will give the general idea of the website." "So, what do you guys think?" "No, pretty much any way I say that is gonna hurt his feelings." "Okay, what's wrong with it?" " What's wrong with it?" " Not you." "I wasn't asking you." " Penny?" " Well, it's a little juvenile." "I mean, it kind of looks like the MySpace page of a 13-year-old girl." "No, it doesn't." "Please." "Dateline could use it to attract predators." "Penny, this is your enterprise, so it's ultimately your decision." "But based on the quality of his work, I'd strongly recommend that we let Leonard go." "You wanna fire me?" "What I want is irrelevant." "This is Penny's decision." "Penny?" "Excuse me, if I did such a bad job, then why do we already have orders?" " We do?" " Uh-huh." "Look." "Mrs. Fiona Fondell from Huntsville, Alabama has ordered two." " No kidding." "Two?" " Uh-huh." "Look at the comments." ""Thank you, Penny Blossoms." "These'll be perfect to cover my bald spots."" "Aww." "Yeah." "That is so sweet." "Camouflaging bald spots." "That's primarily a male concern." "Perhaps we could expand our market." "How are flower barrettes gonna appeal to men?" " We add Bluetooth." " Oh." " Brilliant." "Men love Bluetooth." " Wait a minute." "Wait a minute." "You wanna make a hair barrette with Bluetooth?" "Penny, everything is better with Bluetooth." "Holy crap." "Someone just ordered 1000 Penny Blossoms." "Get out!" "Who needs 1000 sparkly flower barrettes with rhinestones?" ""The fifth annual East Rutherford, New Jersey, Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Alliance Luau."" "Oh, another market to expand into." "Balding gay men." "And I'll bet lesbians love Bluetooth." "We should get to work." "Wait, wait, why does it say "one-day rush"?" "Since when do we offer a one-day rush?" "Amazon offers one-day rush." "Yeah, but they don't have to glue the books together." "How are we gonna make 1000 Penny Blossoms in one day?" "Don't yell at me." "I'm not manufacturing." "I'm just web design." "I have to call them and cancel that order." "Excuse me, but was this not your goal?" "Financial independence through entrepreneurial brilliance and innovation?" "Yeah, my brilliance and innovation, of course, but still." "I just don't see how we can pull this off." "Okay, that, right there, that equivocation and self-doubt that is not the American spirit." "Did Davy Crockett quit at the Alamo?" "Did Jim Bowie?" "They didn't quit." "They were massacred by, like, a gazillion angry Mexicans." "All right, let me put it this way." "Your gross receipts on this one order will be over $3000 for one night's work." "You guys get started." " What are you doing?" " Going online to buy shoes." "If I wanted to spend my Saturday nights doing this I could have stayed in India." "Oh, stop with the fake third-world crap." "Your father's a gynecologist and you had a house full of servants." "We only had four servants." "And two of them were children." "How are we doing?" "We have 128 assorted Penny Blossoms ready to ship." "God, we're never gonna finish in time." " Hold." " Who made Sheldon the boss?" "I believe I'm hearing some negativity on the factory floor." " So?" " The labor force is a living organism that must be nurtured." "Any counterproductive grumbling must be skillfully headed off by management." "Observe." "Hey!" "Less talk, more work." " Nicely done." " Thank you." "You hear any union talk, you let me know." "Sheldon." "Sheldon." " Honey, do you want some coffee?" " No, I don't drink coffee." "If you don't stay awake, we'll never finish." "I'm sorry." "Coffee is out of the question." "When I moved to California, I promised my mother that I wouldn't start doing drugs." "Leonard, help." "Sheldon, we still have 380 of these things to make." "I have faith that you will make them." "Good night." " Leonard." " Yeah" " No." "But, Sheldon, without your insight and leadership, this enterprise will surely fail." "You're right, of course." "Here, this will help." "Very well." "But if this leads to opiates or hallucinogenics you're gonna have to answer to my mother." "Look at Planck's constant." "People say that's arbitrary." "That could not be less arbitrary." "If it varied even slightly life as we know it would not exist." "Bam!" "Now, now, let's reconsider the entire argument but with entropy reversed and effect preceding cause." "So you are thinking of a universe." "It's not expanding from the center, no." "It is retreating from a possibility space." "Bam!" "This is a space where we are all essentially Alice standing in front of the Red Queen and we're being offered a cracker to quench our thirst." "Bam!" "In another universe, let's call that Universe Prime..." " ...there's another Sheldon...." " We should have let him go to bed." "Bam." "I can't believe we actually did it." "One thousand frigging Penny Blossoms." "I just want you guys to know I am really grateful for your help and for every dollar I make, I'm gonna give you 20 cents." "That's your entire profit margin." "Oh." "Then never mind." "I'll print out the shipping label." "Uh-oh." "What?" "We got an email from the East Rutherford, New Jersey, Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Alliance." "They want another 1000 Penny Blossoms." " Really?" " One-day rush." "I really need to take that off the website." "Okay, well, guess we better get started." "You can't be serious." "But, come on." "What about the living organism of the work force and the American spirit?" "And Jiminy Crockett at the Alamo?" "Davy Crockett." "Jiminy Crockett was a cricket." "Yes, I know that, okay?" "I'm tired and I've had 18 cups of coffee." "The point is, if we all just pull together, we can do this." "Who's with me?" "Penny, although you may find it hard to believe, we do have lives." "Leonard?" "Sorry." "My apologies to the gay community of East Rutherford, New Jersey." "Zoom, zoom, zoom!" "Where's the coffee?" "We're all out." "No problem." "I'll be back before this banana hits the ground." "Zoom, zoom, zoom." "Zoom, zoom, zoom." "Yes!" "Sorry, guys, but Secret Agent Laser Obstacle Lunch is just stupid."