Sheldon is working away on his neutrino problem when a text arrives from Penny, tagged with the upside down flag for Emergency "HELP. SURPRISE VISIT FROM MY DAD"
Sheldon hisses venomously. An unexpected surprise! he hated those. They were worse than the approved surprises with three day warnings he allowed monthly, to help build his tolerance.
Of course, he was prepared for this eventuality, having compiled a list of common social situations that occurred when in a relationship. Most seemed like a soap opera, but "Meeting the parents" was a common one.
So, of course, he had spend a few happy hours collecting information about Penny's family and filing it away for when it may come in useful. her parents were Wyatt and Sarah, and she was defiantly the smartest of the three children, as her sister drunkenly shot her husband and her brother seems to enjoy the recreational use of (and retailing) methamphetamine.
He straightened his T-shirts, texted Penny "On my way" and walked over to 4B, mentally bracing himself and cleaning his hands with hand sanitizer in expectation of unfortunately necessary skin contact
Penny opens the door before he knocks , he assumes to hide his knocking habits from her father.
"Dad, this is my boyfriend Sheldon. Sheldon, this is my father, Wyatt."
Sheldon holds out his hand "Pleasure to meet you Sir, and I must say I do like a cowboyish name."
Wyatt's a big, broad shouldered man with a careworn face but an easy smile. "Pleased to meet you Son. I was just telling Penny how I'd like to get to know you. How about I Take you both out for a steak dinner?"
In Wyatts car. "So, Penny tells me you're a real smart cookie. "
Sheldon smugly responds "On most scales I would have to drop 60 IQ points to be merely considered 'smart.' "
From the back seat Penny pipes up "He's got Two doctorates and a bunch of other stuff"
Sheldon smugly smiles "yes, got my first PhD at 16"
"That's a real step up from the guys you used to date. Wasn't it Curtis who had some crazy plan to generate power from Farm waste?"
She sighs. "That was Donnie. Curtis was the one with the petition for Olympic Beer pong"
Sheldon perks up at the thought of science "To be fair that's a valid way of generating methane as a fuel. When I was a child I constructed my first nuclear reactor to provide free power for my neighbourhood. "
Penny sinks back into the seat and sulks. " Donnie just mixed pig poop up with water and piped it into his Mothers Toyota Camry. Stank the car out for weeks. Your reactor actually worked!. "
Sheldon pouts "yes, until the pen-pushers from the department of atomic energy came and took it away, along with my tool shed laboratory and a foot of topsoil from the garden. Apparently a 12 year old needs a special license to operate a nuclear pile and store yellowcake uranium."
Wyatt laughs. "Wow. That's one hell of a way to have a run in with the law. So how did you guys hit it off?"
Sheldon looks back and smiles at Penny "We first met when she moved in over the hall. She was attracted to me and my work. She came and looked at my white board. She said I had a beautiful mind, though I realise now that was a cinematic reference. though, as my goal is a Nobel prize, being compared to John Nash was flattering. She sat in my spot and wanted me to sit next to her. she didn't run screaming like people usually do. Things just went on from there"
Penny covers her face with her hand, laughing "yeah, it was something like that. and Sheldon's been helping me learn stuff and I've been teaching him to let his hair down."
"well, it's just nice to see you've found a nice young man with no facial tattoos or outstanding convictions"
"I'm sorry to disappoint you, but I must confess I do have a criminal record. Apart from the underage possession of nuclear materials I have spent a night in jail for insulting a judge, ran a red light on a mission of mercy, have restraining orders from Stan Lee, Leonard Nimoy, Carl Sagan and Bill Nye, and was arrested for trespassing on George Lucas's ranch."
Wyatt laughs "ah Son, that's hardly anything, you should meet Randall!"
Penny winces.
Later
After eating Penny heads to the Ladies room to freshen up.
Sheldon leans forward, face serious "Wyatt, may I have a word with you, man to man?"
Wyatt smiles an easy smile at the strange lanky Texan "sure son, what's up?"
"It's about Penny. Are you proud of her accomplishments?"
"what do you mean?"
" you proud of her accomplishments? Moving out here, following her dream, standing on her own two feet while fighting to get a job in the exceedingly cut throat movie business?"
"Well, sure I am."
"Have you told her that?"
Wyatt shifts, embarrassed. "sure I have, lots of times."
"really. when was the last?"
He pauses. "well, she knows I am. "
"does she?" Sheldon persists, raising an eyebrow.
"What are you saying son?" Wyatt asks defensively.
"That she's smarter and more able than people give her credit for"
"Sure my little Pumpkins smart, heck when she was helping her momma bake she always knew all the recipes."
"Really? Do you think you can memorise a list of 35 items and have them at your fingertips?"
He glances up as Penny comes back and takes a horribly contrived casual stance
"Gee Penny, we were just talking about cocktails of all things. How many are on the menu at the bar?"
She shrugs "Oh, loads. Like 30."
"What are the third and 28th? "
Without skipping a beat she says "Cosmo and Tom Collins, why?"
Sheldon arches an eyebrow at Wyatt and continues in a stilted tone "That is most interesting, What is in those?"
She shrugs "a Cosmo is vodka, triple sec, cranberry and lime. Tom is gin, lemon, syrup and club soda. Pretty easy ." She sips her drink and looks perplexed. "Why, what's up? Neither of you are cocktail drinkers."
Wyatt looks at her in wide eyed surprise. She narrows her eyes and stares venomously at Sheldon
"Sheldon What did you say to him?"
"Oh Nothing, just that you've been hiding your light under a bubbly blonde bushel as being smart was not seen as part of being a girl"
She glared at him, furiously "Sheldon! will you stop that!"
"Just stating the facts"
She took a deep breath and smiles "Sweetie, what does the Korean phrase nunchi eoptta mean again?"
"oh, that means lacking the ability to listen and gauge others' moods. being devoid of emotional intelligence, nunchi is literally "eye measuring" so it's being blind to social clues most people can see... " he looks at her, at Wyatt, at her again, finally catching on "Oh. Did I overstep?"
Through gritted teeth she mutters "A little"
Wyatt is watching them open mouthed "You two always at it like this?"
"only when she's being stubborn!"
"only when he's being stubborn!"
They say simultaneously, stop, look at each other then break down laughing
The waitress comes over with another round of four beers, and a sealed bottle of water for Sheldon.
As they drink, Sheldon ponders "I think I see the problem. She's always been like this hasn't she?"
Wyatt grins, "Yup, cute as a button"
Penny snorts into her beer.
Sheldon smiles "Penny, why don't you do the Streetcar epigram"
"What, now?"
"The Broken tower, it's your favourite. Come on. 'And so it was I entered the broken world'"
Penny sighs then gathered herself, taking his hands in hers, looking at him with eyes deep pools of suffering and devotion as she intoned;
"And so it was I entered the broken world
To trace the visionary company of love, its voice
An instant in the wind (I know not whither hurled)
But not for long to hold each desperate choice. "
She turned her face away with a sob.
Wyatt gawped then applauded. "damn Pumpkin, those acting lessons really paid off!"
Sheldon chuckles "He can't see the electrons for the Protons mass"
Wyatt asks "Eh?" as Penny playfully punches Sheldon's arm
Sheldon explains " that's a spoof of the Bourne-Oppenheimer approximation"
Wyatt is even more perplexed and looks at Penny
Penny sighed. "It's a physics thing joke. Basically they assume a two thousandish factor size difference..."
Sheldon interrupts " 1836! "
"Whatever" she continues "A two thousandish factor size difference means you can treat protons and electrons separately. It's rough but it kind of works, but in his field they prize accuracy so much it's like mocking yokels for measuring stuff with notches in a stick. it's kinda like the 'at least it's not North Dakota' Nebraska joke. " she shrugs and knocks back her beer "Yeah, I've turned into the Sheldon whisperer ."
