S01.E06: A Patch, a Modem, and a Zantac®

[Katy M]

this wasn't a game or a performance or a competition, though.  This was the equivalent of dragging kids to other kids' doctor appointments just to sit in the waiting room.

[OtterMommy]

3 hours ago, Katy M said:

this wasn't a game or a performance or a competition, though.  This was the equivalent of dragging kids to other kids' doctor appointments just to sit in the waiting room.

True...but I'm sure that--thanks only to their age--Missy and Sheldon would have been taken along to one of their older brother's appointments  However, I doubt the inverse would be true.

[ItCouldBeWorse]

8 minutes ago, OtterMommy said:

3 hours ago, Katy M said:

this wasn't a game or a performance or a competition, though.  This was the equivalent of dragging kids to other kids' doctor appointments just to sit in the waiting room.

True...but I'm sure that--thanks only to their age--Missy and Sheldon would have been taken along to one of their older brother's appointments  However, I doubt the inverse would be true.

They could have stayed home with Meemaw, but I guess she wanted to see the outcome, also!

[OtterMommy]

Just now, ItCouldBeWorse said:

They could have stayed home with Meemaw, but I guess she wanted to see the outcome, also!

Meemaw might have been busy...it appears she has quite the social life!

[AnnaRose]

Well, it has a visitor's center/Space Museum, so they could have considered it educational to bring the other kids along and at least have a look around.

I enjoyed this episode a lot.  Particularly Sheldon on the phone seeking a second mortgage, visiting his Meemaw hoping for money to buy a computer, and thanking his Dad in the car. 

I also really liked Annie Potts' reaction at the dinner table when she told Sheldon she was thinking the same thing, Sheldon said "Really?", and she replied, "I love you Moonpie!"  Her delivery is so perfect.  You can tell how much she adores him, but she also really gets a kick out of him.

Edited December 6, 2017 by AnnaRose

[Katy M]

1 hour ago, OtterMommy said:

Meemaw might have been busy...it appears she has quite the social life!

Seeing as how Mee-Maw went with them so that she could sit in the waiting room all day also, apparently she wasn't busy.

 

1 hour ago, AnnaRose said:

Well, it has a visitor's center/Space Museum, so they could have considered it educational to bring the other kids along and at least have a look around.

But, did they look around?  We only saw them sitting there looking bored.  George said they were going to NASA, Sheldon was going to do his thing and they were going back.  No stops.  That probably included the visitor's center.

[OtterMommy]

42 minutes ago, Katy M said:

Seeing as how Mee-Maw went with them so that she could sit in the waiting room all day also, apparently she wasn't busy.

 

But, did they look around?  We only saw them sitting there looking bored.  George said they were going to NASA, Sheldon was going to do his thing and they were going back.  No stops.  That probably included the visitor's center.

I should probably watch this episode again as I completely forgot Meemaw was there.  That, of course, begs the question...why was Meemaw there?

[Bort]

1 hour ago, AnnaRose said:

Well, it has a visitor's center/Space Museum, so they could have considered it educational to bring the other kids along and at least have a look around.

The visitor's center didn't open until 1992. At that time frame, there was literally nothing to do there. In fact, I'm surprised they got past the front gate.

[BlossomCulp]

3 hours ago, AnnaRose said:

I enjoyed this episode a lot.  Particularly Sheldon on the phone seeking a second mortgage, visiting his Meemaw hoping for money to buy a computer, and thanking his Dad in the car. 

I liked the reminder that computers back in the day were major bucks.  I remember when we got out first home computer, desktop, back in the early '90s it cost about $2800 (Cdn).  Might have been more.  And compared to what you can do on a phone now,  25ish yrs later, it's just ridiculous when you think of the cost!

Edited December 7, 2017 by BlossomCulp

[SparklesBitch]

11 hours ago, Katy M said:

I thought it was unfair to the other kids.  Why did they all have to go?  They got in the car drove to Houston, sat in a waiting room for hours and then drove back home.  They didn't even get to stop at the ostrich farm that both George Jr. and Missy wanted to.  Missy even got thrown up on.

My two cents on this is pretty much this: 

9 hours ago, BlossomCulp said:

It was unfair but it was also real life.  I long lost count of the times the rest of us kids got dragged along because of some event of another for another sibling.  In my family, and I guess Sheldon's too, if one went, we all went!

I have two younger brothers and I spent my childhood being dragged from sports event to sports event because my mom wanted us all to be together to support thier efforts. Both my brothers were also dragged along to my (non-sports) events. 

So, yeah. Unfair, but real life. 

Also, maybe more practically, lack of reliable babysitters, maybe? If Meemaw wanted to go along on the trip and it was last minute, maybe they didn’t have access to reliable and/or affordable childcare for Missy and Georgie.

[LoneHaranguer]

8 minutes ago, BlossomCulp said:

I liked the reminder that computers back in the day were major bucks.  I remember when we got out first home computer, desktop, back in the early '90s it cost about $2800 (Cdn).

For this purpose, I think Sheldon would have gone for something nerdy, so around $1000 or so would have covered it. 

[AnnaRose]

2 hours ago, kariyaki said:

The visitor's center didn't open until 1992. At that time frame, there was literally nothing to do there. In fact, I'm surprised they got past the front gate.

That's surprising since I was a docent at the NASA Glenn visitor center way back in the early eighties. I assumed Houston NASA center had one by then too. 

[Katy M]

1 hour ago, SparklesBitch said:

Also, maybe more practically, lack of reliable babysitters, maybe? If Meemaw wanted to go along on the trip and it was last minute, maybe they didn’t have access to reliable and/or affordable childcare for Missy and Georgie.

Georgie's 14.  In 1990 that was more than old enough to stay home alone for a few hours.  

[LoneHaranguer]

16 hours ago, Katy M said:

Georgie's 14.  In 1990 that was more than old enough to stay home alone for a few hours

It's also not long after movies like Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Adventures in Babysitting, and Risky Business showed what can go on when parents aren't around.

[Katy M]

2 hours ago, LoneHaranguer said:

It's also not long after movies like Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Adventures in Babysitting, and Risky Business showed what can go on when parents aren't around.

Well, I'm around that age, and I can't remember any parent afraid to leave a teenager home alone based on stupid movies.  And, two of those movies were based on long-term absences.  Not a few hours.

[ItCouldBeWorse]

22 hours ago, OtterMommy said:

I should probably watch this episode again as I completely forgot Meemaw was there.  That, of course, begs the question...why was Meemaw there?

As I said earlier, she probably wanted to see the outcome.  She's quite invested in Sheldon's life.

[BlossomCulp]

21 hours ago, Katy M said:

Georgie's 14.  In 1990 that was more than old enough to stay home alone for a few hours.  

I remember being 19 or 20 and babysitting a family for a long week-end.  The oldest son was about 15.  I don't think they ever let the boy babysit though, even just for an evening or an afternoon.  Some 14 yr olds babysit and some can barely look after themselves let alone younger siblings.  I'm assuming Georgie's parents think he falls in the latter camp.

Aside from which if they didn't bring the kids and MeeMaw along then the actors involved wouldn't have gotten to be in this episode as much :).

[formerlyfreedom]

I know this is sexist (trust me!), but I think in the timeframe that the show is set in, there was a reluctance in many households to leave a teen boy 'in charge' - mainly, it wasn't 'male stuff' to watch kids.

Don't throw things at me, please. This is also the same time frame where I threw a huge fit when my brother let my 2 1/2 years younger brother mow with the riding lawn mower, without even considering if it was something I could/should do. I was a girl, why would I want to ride that thing? (BECAUSE IT WAS FREAKING AWESOME!) I was a fireball mini-feminist, and didn't even know it at the time!

[Zoe]

The Elon Musk stinger was great!

[Driad]

9 hours ago, Zoe said:

The Elon Musk stinger was great!

What is a stinger, please?  I looked it up but can't find a definition that looks relevant.

[Zoe]

5 minutes ago, Driad said:

What is a stinger, please?  I looked it up but can't find a definition that looks relevant.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheStinger

[AnnaRose]

I thought it's generally called a 'tag' or an 'end-tag' scene.  And the one before the credits is a 'teaser'.  I never heard 'stinger' for a television show.  Elon Musk was great though, in whatever you want to call that scene.

[SparklesBitch]

On 12/6/2017 at 8:19 PM, Katy M said:

Georgie's 14.  In 1990 that was more than old enough to stay home alone for a few hours.  

Very true, but as for this part: 

On 12/7/2017 at 3:24 PM, Katy M said:

Well, I'm around that age, and I can't remember any parent afraid to leave a teenager home alone based on stupid movies.  And, two of those movies were based on long-term absences.  Not a few hours.

That wasn’t all there was to it, at least in my experience, and I grew up in the 80s too. Like I said before, I have two younger brothers and I got carted along everywhere even though I was plenty old enough and responsible enough to stay home alone, even overnight. This was straight from my parents’ mouths at the time. However, because one (or both, depending on the situation) of my younger brothers would pitch a fit if I got to stay home while they had to go to wherever it was they didn’t want to go, I was forced to go along to wherever it was we were going because it was easier for my parents to make me go rather than spend time fighting with my brothers.....which is how I ended up going to a babysitter during summer breaks from school clear up until I was approximately 15. I either sat on the couch and read or acted as free labor for the babysitter, watching the kids while she watched soaps. What fun! 

Unfair? I sure thought so at the time. 

Understandable? Yeah, I kind of get it better now that I’m an adult. Sometimes busy parents just don’t want to argue. 

So, the point of my big long story is that it makes sense to me that Mary and George made Missy and Georgie come along even if they didn’t want to and there was nothing for them to do. It’s realistic and fits with my experience as a kid growing up in the 80s.

[Nancypants]

On 12/2/2017 at 1:32 PM, Browncoat said:

What year is this show set in?  It's only been fairly recently (20 years or so) that the bacterium H. pylori was accepted as the primary cause of ulcers.  It was discovered as the cause in the early 80s, but not accepted as such until sometime in the 90s.

Definitely mid to late 80s. ( Axl rose poster, hairstyles, pre -Windows computers with green display)

[wilnil]

1989, IIRC.

[Kiddvideo]

This might be my favorite episode. George’s line and delivery, after the doctor said it was nice Sheldon was trying to help NASA, “He’s just doing it outta spite” cracks me up every time. 

[voiceover]

As he was writing the script, the doctor asked Mary & George if Sheldon smoked. Loved that his response to Mary’s shocked “He’s nine years old!” was mentioning he’d started smoking at that age too (“But only when I drank.”).