Rock-Paper-Scissors-Lizard-Spock

As I've mentioned before, I love that TV sitcom The Big Bang Theory. Generally speaking, my 17-year old son, Joseph, and I don’t have much in common with regard to our TV-viewing habits – he prefers sports while I tend toward science and science fiction (on the bright side, we both think I'm wonderful, so that's OK).

However, Joseph recently started to watch TBBT, so now we have a program we can enjoy together if an episode happens to come our way. A few days ago we watched The Lizard-Spock Expansion (Season 2, Episode 8) in which Raj and Sheldon are trying to work out which TV program they should watch.

Raj suggests they use the Rock-Paper-Scissors game to decide, but Sheldon explains that when you know someone well enough, ~80% of any Rock-Paper-Scissors games you play with that person end up in a tie. Sheldon then goes on to propose a variation on the game that reduces the chances of ending in a tie by including two additional weapons: the Lizard (formed by the hand as a sock-puppet-like mouth) and Spock (formed by the Star Trek Vulcan salute).

This has to be one of the funniest scenes in the program (Click Here to see it on YouTube).


Joseph and I had a good laugh at this, and then Joseph said "I wish I could learn how to do that." This immediately reminded me of the classic scene from the Woody Allen film Small Time Crooks (1999) in which one of the characters says "I'd like to learn how to spell Connecticut. Don't ask me why. I never knew how to spell Connecticut." The point being, of course, that he could have learned this anytime he wanted to … if he'd really wanted to.

Thus it was that the next day I had a quick Google (don’t worry, no one was looking) to find the words, which are as follows:

Scissors cuts Paper,
Paper covers Rock,
Rock crushes Lizard,
Lizard poisons Spock,
Spock smashes Scissors,
Scissors decapitates Lizard,
Lizard eats Paper,
Paper disproves Spock,
Spock vaporizes Rock,
And, as always, Rock crushes Scissors

Along the way, I was surprised to discover that the Rock-Paper-Scissors-Lizard-Spock game predates The Big Bang Theory, and was in fact invented by Sam Kass and Karen Bry. Sam obviously has a sense of humor, because on his website he says: "Note that for those of you who like to swing your fist back and forth and say, 'Rock, Paper, Scissors, GO!', might want to continue to do that, replacing 'Rock' with 'One,' 'Paper' with 'Two,' and 'Scissors' with 'Three'" (You have to laugh.)

Anyway, it took me only a few minutes to memorize this new version (performing the associated hand gestures a la Sheldon is a bit harder). So when I returned home that evening, I fixed Joseph with a steely look and said "Now Joseph, I want you to sit up and listen to this because I'm only going to say it one time…" (Joseph obviously thought he was going to be told off for something) and then I performed the Rock-Paper-Scissors-Lizard-Spock sketch complete and replete with hand gestures.

Ha! 10 points to me I think!

But wait, there's more, because I was happily meandering my way around the Think Geek website (as you do) when I ran across a Rock-Paper-Scissors-Lizard-Spock T-Shirt:


Well, of course I had to have one to really celebrate my victory. This little beauty just arrived in the post. I'm wearing it as we speak. Now I cannot wait for young Joseph to return from school (grin).

---

If you found this article to be interest, visit Microcontroller / MCU Designline where – in addition to my Max's Cool Beans blogs on all sorts of "stuff" – you will find the latest and greatest design, technology, product, and news articles with regard to all aspects of designing and using microcontrollers.

Also, you can obtain a highlights update delivered directly to your inbox by signing up for my weekly newsletter – just Click Here to request this newsletter using the Manage Newsletters tab (if you aren't already a member you'll be asked to register, but it's free and painless so don't let that stop you [grin]).

Last but certainly not least, make sure you check out all of the discussions and other information resources at All Programmable Planet. For example, in addition to blogs by yours truly, microcontroller expert Duane Benson is learning how to use FPGAs to augment (sometimes replace) the MCUs in his robot (and other) projects.