Numb3rs: Longshot (Episode 306)

There are some important elements to look at in this eppesode. It's the coat, hair, ability to run, the stud and other such family ties, nerve, stamina and which one looks like a damn sweet ride that matters most when picking your favourite.

I'm sorry, you thought I was talking about the horses?

Opening Grid: 6 furlongs, 6 winners, 6 bodies, Pick 6. (I'm sensing a theme here. There's a bunch of sixes. It's the sixth eppesode of the season. The number of the beast is everywhere! How appropriate for the eppesode prior to Halloween.)

Race Track: A very nerdy-looking young man is watching a race. Like most of the people at the track, he's not paying attention to anything around him but the horses. He looks hopeful as they near the finish line.

And now he looks dead. As he was watching the horses, this random scary looking guy comes up and stabs him three times without anyone, even the victim noticing. Methinks they put the blinkers on the audience, not the horses. Someone needs to talk to the grooms about that.

In the Now-Dead-Nerd's hand, a notebook lies open. Hmm, I wonder if it'll be filled with equations? It seems every other dead person carries around an equation-filled notebook on this show. Bless them, it gives us a reason to have more Charlie every week. Not that we really need a reason.

Cal Sci: Larry is beating skin with his big stick (not like that!) and the noise is more deafening than the aforementioned horse race.

Trying to avoid Larry's subsequent slaughter by the Cal Sci Physics Department, Charlie runs in demanding to know why Larry isn't using coconuts to imitate the sound of horses instead. Maybe I just imagined that.

Giving a brief lesson about primitive cultures, Larry says that drumming was used for communication with dead, and he's calling the corpse of his inspiration as he does not "percuss for pleasure." By the way, "Percuss For Pleasure" would be the great name for an alternative band. If you use it, I expect royalties.

Charlie suggests Larry try a quieter way of thinking -- the hot tub. Dismissing any chance at more Larry nudity, Larry says that even Archimedes would probably take a cold shower over his dilemma. You see, Larry is having a problem incorporating sex with Megan into his life. Being the only male on the planet who would see this as a problem, Larry's just having difficulty with his emotional side and it's now affecting his work.

Charlie just thinks it's Larry's "emotional uncertainty" that is causing the problem, but also admits that he doesn't know that much about Larry's emotions. Fanfic writers everywhere decry that statement.

Left feeling uncomfortable by all this talk of emotion, Charlie starts beating the drums. What a pair of, well, men.

Churchill Downs: Don and Colby are filling us in on the details. The longshot in the race was winning, so no one noticed a guy being stabbed at least three times (probably six, given the grid). The notebook also comes into play as Colby thinks that it's a "complicated betting scheme." I ponder, how does Colby know that? It's not like he went to school for math or anything.

The whole reason for their arrival at the scene was because a member of the OC called. I momentarily dread the appearance of Mischa Barton but then realize she would never schlep to guest-starring on another series. She definitely doesn't need the money for food. Now, the OC means the Organized Crime Unit, led by one Liz Warner, Don's pupil from Quantico. From the way she greets him, I start cringing at the thought that a second Eppes brother might be destined to sleep with a former student. (Although, I would sign up for anything the Eppes brothers would teach, if I could earn some extra credit. Don't judge me.)

Liz is currently heading the OC due to her boss' leave of absence and has been investigating a gambling racket at the track. The head guy, an Ivan Tebachian, is squeezing the owner of the track and she thinks the victim, Danny Roberts (Now Dead Nerd) has been helping him. Don thinks it's thin but Liz insists; with the notebook were thirty winning bets, all from the last ten days.

Cal Sci: "Explain to me why the drum has to be in my office?" Charlie asks. Any scene that begins with something that random, needs to be moved into last week's eppesode.

The arrival of the drum into Charlie's office was just a way of Larry being moved into Charlie's office so he could be part of the scene. (There is a weak justification about carpet cleaning, but really, do you care?) The drum heralds the arrival of Larry's emotional problem, Megan, with Don. (Not that Don's part of the problem because that would be a whole new level of Fanfic.)

Trying to avoid Larry saying something, well, like Larry, Charlie awkwardly invites everyone out to dinner. Don's got other things on his mind, like the notebook, and asks Charlie to take a look at it.

Megan takes the lead into asking about dinner and Larry natters an absurd response, "I know, I-I-I-I-I've just been so bogged down with..." which, besides being an obvious avoidance tactic, is this week's Numb3rs Painfully Awkward Line™.

"Lawrence, come take a gander at this." For the first time ever, I actually considered having two NPALs, but Krumholtz manages to deliver this affected gem of a line with aplomb.

What he wants Larry to gander at, is some very sophisticated math. Larry spouts out a further description about topos and Bach, but I like Charlie's "very sophisticated" definition. Why? I understand it.

The strange thing about the equations is that they aren't trying to pick the winner, they're trying to predict second place. Larry thinks it's counter-intuitive and I laugh at him; he obviously didn't bet on Invisible Ink in the Kentucky Derby in 2001. Larry may know a thing or two about almost everything else, but he doesn't know jack about the sport of kings.

Fade to New Title Flash That I Refuse to Call Credits: Did anybody notice several strange things out of place in the last scene? Continuing the 6 motif, there are six unsolved mysteries in that last scene. Look here.

Figured them out? Once you think you have check below.

IHOF: On today's menu, horse meat and algorithms, as Don and Megan still haven't asked me about why anyone would be on second place. They think it has something to do with races being fixed and that no one would suspect second place is fixed, but flags would be raised if the longshot was always the winner.

Colby interrupts them as there's been a reported break in at Dead-Nerd's apartment. Hopefully David will be there, otherwise I might get all sad at the idea he isn't in this eppesode.

Dead-Nerd's: The landlady is less than helpful in explaining to Colby and Megan why the apartment is trashed. She took a product placement Ambien prior to bed and didn't hear a thing. The one helpful thing she does is provide information about the victim's girlfriend, a computer expert who lives in San Pedro.

La Maison d'Eppes: Alan is back to his traditional food-provider role, as he arrives with a bag of groceries and offering lunch to the hungry professor. Charlie is still pouring over the equations as he can't find the logic in them. Obviously picking up the symbolic fruit special, Alan comments that the raspberries are cheap because the anti-oxidants in blueberries make them difficult to find. With the solution so nicely provided by the symbolic fruit special, Charlie rushes off to see Don, telling his father he'll be late for dinner.

"I'm going out for dinner," Alan replies. Somebody's getting some tonight!

Pimlico Race Course: Liz is obviously looking for her own ride at the stables, and I'm still not talking about the horses. Don recalls a woman who was an adrenaline junkie, but she insists it's just a hobby. Can we move off the flirty bits? Can someone please remember Robin? (That's my battle cry this season.)

Thankfully, some writer listens to my plea, as we move onto the convoluted explanation to how they found the racket at the track. They traced a drug-dealer to the track, and while they never saw him dealing at the track, they stumbled on Tebachian and his scheme. The owner of the track won't cooperate because as long as the track is making money, he figures Tebachian won't kill him.

Don wants to shake things up in regards to the owner and when Liza asks what his game is, Don replies, "It's more of a hobby." Remember Robin!

The owner, Mr. Connors, must've really gotten himself in some financial trouble, as he's grooming a horse. Come to think of it, he's grooming a horse in white pants. Poor man, can't afford the proper staff or attire at his own track. Either that, or he's hitting new levels of Colby dumb.

The usual ask but nothing's answered game is played. The owner insists he didn't know the victim or anything beyond the tragic events at the track the day before. While Don gets a call, the owner refuses to answer any more questions.

"You know, it doesn't really matter if you answer our questions because all Tebachian's going to hear is that you were talking to the FBI," Liz tells him. Wow, I could really like this woman, if she'd stop poaching on Robin's territory.

IHOF: On today's menu -- witty banter. Colby's doing all the research by himself, as David has vanished. Channeling the powers of his partner, Colby's pulled Dead-Nerd's phone records, which has only two regular numbers, his girlfriend's and Palimar Off-Track Betting. Megan's barely paying attention to him, as apparently, all the milk for coffee in the International House of Fedcakes, has gone bad. After checking two cartons, she gives up. Bad milk? That’s definitely affecting their AAA rating.

Colby makes a crack about Megan's car. Megan tells him not to "playa hate." Colby totally plays into expectations by at first claiming not to have called the OTB, but then reveals that without a subpoena, he can't learn anything. Look at my restraint about not making a crack about Colby "learning anything." I've matured. No I haven't.

Cal Sci: Charlie is explaining to Don and Liz about parimutuel betting, the system that is used at races and by bookmakers to determine the favourite. As he tries to go into the historical background, Don cuts him off, but if you're curious, you can read about it here. The idea is that, betting on the favourite to win might produce a lower reward than betting on the second place to place, because the odds are probably much higher. It also avoids garnering a great deal of attention. No kidding.

San Pedro: Dead-Nerd's girlfriend, Sarah, is devastated by the loss of her man. Just to make sure we know how devastated, the camera pans down over her left hand, complete with engagement ring. Megan shoos Colby for a little girly tete a tete.

We find out a few things about the couple. The first is that they were going to be married about the time next year Diane Farr will give birth. The second is that in the relationship, Sherilyn was the geek, and Danny was outgoing, even though he didn't talk to anyone at the track. These two must be a blast to invite to a party. (Megan totally understands the whole geek appeal.) Finally, Sherilyn had no idea her boyfriend had won any bets as she usually paid his rent.

IHOF: On today's menu -- confusion! The loving couple and the hidden bets don't add up. What else doesn't add up, besides the fact Liz has taken Megan's chair and I'm confused why Megan isn't asserting her dominance in the office, is that the victim only placed one bet at the OTB. It was a pick six, picking the winner in six straight races. Not only did the victim win half a million, but also he never cashed the ticket. Six winners and half a million? Umm, so where did this guy live? Might the ticket still be there? I volunteer to check.

Outside IHOF: Liz and Colby are going for a walk on the ever-used concrete bridge, talking about Don's skills as an instructor. Apparently, Don was instructing at Quantico just after he finished up a tour manhunting with Billy and was just getting reacquainted with civilization. Excuse me, I'd like an order of disheveled and mildly uncivilized Don to go please!

Colby, in what I think is an "I'm trying to hit on you by sharing my innermost feelings" moment, confesses that he's asking all about Don because of his screw up a few weeks previously. Liz reassures him that since he's still around, Don's forgiven him, but tempers it with a warning that he won't be forgiven twice. This makes me ask, is she talking about Don, or me?

Together, the two of them, which I will more than happily 'ship if the writers choose to go that way, make a breakthrough on the case. The victim probably placed the bet at the OTB to avoid the tellers at the track, who all know him. This means that perhaps the Dead-Nerd wasn't working for Tebachian, but just beat the system, which would upset Tebachian even more.

Math Garage: Charlie and Larry are discussing the improbability of the victim's system working, when Alan foolishly comes to try and do laundry. Silly Alan! Since when has the garage ever been used for laundry?

Lamenting their lack of knowledge about horse-racing, Alan reveals his own love for the sport. Really Alan, you didn't need to have another reason for me to love you.

"I would never have pegged you as a railbird," Larry tells him. Yeah, well, no one pegged you as a card shark either. Larry also rightly theorizes that Mama Eppes wasn't quite as keen on the horses as Alan. Turns out she liked college funds instead. Not like Charlie needed a college fund. If somebody tries to tell me that Charlie didn't have a complete free ride through Princeton, I'm going to laugh. Oh, and for Don, didn't he have baseball? I've heard of a few people going to college on sports scholarships too. The Eppes certainly got off easy on post-secondary bills!

Alan wisely forgets the laundry and invites Charlie to morning workouts at the track. He also invites Larry along but Larry refuses, as he was once traumatized by seeing a man trampled to death by a pack of horses. Of course, this was a pack of Merry-go-round horses. I've heard of that. Wasn't that on the Fox special, Mary Poppins Gone Wild?

Alan and Charlie quickly depart, hoping there's not any more to that story.

IHOF: On the menu today -- one likeable new female character. Liz tells Don all about the theory that the victim was not working for Tebachian and all possible connections have turned up dry.

When Don mentions running something by Charlie we get a fantastic little scene about how Don didn't talk about himself at Quantico and how he's changed. We then have the one defining moment that endeared Liz to me forever. Talking about Don's emotional progress, Liz comments about how she's heard about Don and a certain "Federal Prosecutor." See, just recognizing he's some else's territory alluding to Robin makes me happy. I squee even more when Liz expresses amazement at Don Eppes being with the same woman for "longer than a week."

Back onto the case, Don can't understand why, if the victim wasn't working for Tebachian, Dead-Nerd is now a dead nerd. We get a lovely story about how when one trainer crossed Tebachian, he had the trainer nailed into a stall where he was promptly kicked to death. Didn't I say it was a lovely story? The picture book is coming out next year. I think Madonna's writing it.

Belmont Park: Alan is now introducing Charlie to his second sport (after golf), horse-racing. Explaining what I already know, the bias with the betting can let someone make a lot of money on second place. Charlie's upset because it took him half a day to figure out using math when he simply could've asked Alan, or me.

The way to pick a winner goes like this, one must look at "past performance, type of course, track condition and the experience of the jockey" plus the breeding line and judging who would just be a sweet ride. This time, I am talking about the horses. Although, it's not enough for Charlie, he wants to take into account things like weather and wind speed but Alan cuts him off. (Charlie's cut off twice in one eppesode! It's a record!) "You can't think of everything," Alan says.

Charlie's ready with an answer, "You can, if you think of everything." That's my megalomaniacal geek.

The conversation veers back into reality, as Alan points out that only cheating would make it consistent. That's today's secret word everybody (and I bet you all thought it was raspberries!) as Charlie has a eureka moment. Dead-Nerd was using cheating as the basis for his system.

While Charlie's explaining this, Alan's already pulled out his cell phone and started dialing. He's calling Don for Charlie. Thus far, this moment wins for the best family dynamic scene of the season, and Don's only in it via a mention and a phone call.

Cal Sci: Larry is shaving in his office when Megan unexpectedly shows up. Taken aback, Larry doesn't understand her purpose but she, being the free spirit she is, didn't even know she was coming until she arrived. She's picked up on his recent awkwardness between them, proving how good she is at observation. How could anyone possibly tell when Larry is being more awkward?

The root of the problem is that Larry feels their relationship has the structure of baryogenesis -- a phrase which means here, "completely unstructured" for those of us without degrees in physics.

She's surprised that a man who sleeps in his car (I still think he sleeps in the LIGO lab!) needs structure. "Few things are better organized than a 1931 Ford," Larry insists.

Taking the awesomeness of this relationship to a new level, Megan says that structure is all right with her, and then promptly asks him out on a date. When he tries to wiggle out of it, she nuzzles right up to him and, yuppers, his calendar is clear. I think that's a euphemism.

Santa Anita Park: Charlie, with the help of Papa "It Was All My Idea" Eppes, is explaining to Don about how the victim took into account cheating, and then was able to pick thirty winners. He uses the comparison of the weather report. That when they say it's going to be warm, and it snows outside, it's either a freak accident, or Edmonton, Alberta. If it happens more than a few times, we're either in Edmonton or unknown factors are in play. ("Cheating!" Alan exclaims!)

Using Dead-Nerd's algorithm, Charlie's found there are six (there's that number again!) pick six winners. Ladies and gentlemen, I don't think we're in Edmonton.

IHOF: On the menu today -- smug Megan. Arriving back from her rendezvous with Larry, Megan says she got Colby's message about the newest developments. The real question here is, why couldn't Megan answer her phone? Taking the high road, Colby doesn't want to ask. Either that, or it's like asking a sibling about their sex life, which simply does not happen. He only comments that Megan and Larry are a weird pairing. Yeah, well, they're like Edmonton, the freaky weather has to happen somewhere and it isn't a coincidence I used the word "freaky" in this sentence.

The two make another important discovery, besides the fact that, as coworkers, their sex lives are a taboo discussion topic, that all the six (including the initial victim at the start of this eppesode) pick six winners are dead. (Six pick six winners were killed resulting in six deaths! The end is nigh I tell you!) Or The End is available at your local bookstore.)

Later, our three Fedcakes with today's Fedcake special, are going over the newest information. Statistically, something doesn't work out but Liz is wary of picking up Tebachian this early because she doesn't want to see if he has a more creative death than nailing a guy to a stall and having a horse do the dirty work.

La Maison d'Eppes: Our favourite outfit of Larry's is back -- the bathrobe! He's just taken a shower at the Eppes abode, promising not to make a habit of it. The bathrobe is only for very special eppesodes anyway.

Opening up a serious conversation about his current lifestyle, Larry is worried about his "nomadic" existence and Alan figures that Megan is tired of "parking" with Larry. He offers Larry the condo brochures that were collected before the current truce in the Eppes House War was reached. (Parties are still negotiating on the terms of the peace treaty. Rumour has it that they're deadlocked over rights to the guest bathroom.)

Larry being the most grounded he's ever been on this show, has realized that he needs to have some of the stability of a normal life. That, and his car doesn't have a back seat.

IHOF: On the menu -- foreign specialties. Before the five other pick six victims died, their accounts were cleaned out and they were issued a cashier's cheque. All the cashier's cheques were then cashed in countries that I can't spell with pretty lenient banking laws. Trying to come up with a connection, Megan and Colby realize they were all unemployed and their connection is the unemployment office, which, conveniently, Colby knows is two blocks away. I guess he looked into that after his big cover up for a traitor incident.

Math Garage: Larry, moping about his new-found normalcy, interrupts Charlie, who is frustrated by his lack of data in connecting the dead pick six winners to Tebachian. Thinking Larry isn't paying attention, Charlie gets all snappy but Larry just gives him a quick solution (use the data you do have and connect through the bets) and moves on to the fun part of this scene, the character issues.

"Do you find me overly structured?" Larry laments.

In the best explanation of Larry ever, Charlie first points out two paradoxes, Larry doesn't have a house, but eats "monochromatically." Using the Larry-metaphor against its creator, Charlie compares him to the issues that divide quantum mechanics and the theory of relativity, and, like those theories, "There is no unifying theory for Larry Fleinhardt." He also suggests that Megan is Larry's "personal gravity." Who says you can't say lovely sentiments using mathematical metaphors?

You see, I would like to calculate angles with Charlie and discuss the exact equations of certain pressure points. Wait, I was supposed to go for something nice there, not dirty. Okay, I'll leave the nice to the professional mathematicians.

Oh yeah, and for you fanfic writers fact collectors out there, Charlie was a student in Larry's physics class at Princeton. Don't tell me that 3498742589645964598 (actual number) plot bunnies weren't just born.

Unemployment Office: Megan and Colby are talking to the epitome of a public servant, who is all official sounding and quite useless overall. She can't really help, but does pull up a list of companies where the five winners interviewed. Colby recognizes the name of the racetrack but the civil servant can't find out who they talked to because "It takes five days to make a request." Your tax dollars at work people!

Cal Sci: Charlie is into a full two Red Bull panic when Don and Liz arrive. He's found out that the cheating has been going on consistently and that the frequency of the cheating is increasing. He’s also terrified that Tebachian and his crew might hunt down the winners from the other fixed races and kill them too. Refusing to be assuaged by his brother's assurances that people would notice that many new dead bodies, Charlie thinks they won't, particularly if they're all "accidents."

Cal Sci: On today's menu, a rare delicacy, Colby's idea! The search for 18 different dead people who won on the fixed races comes up empty. Colby thinks (that word is not used in an ironic sense) that perhaps they're really looking for 6 people who won a great deal during those 18 dates Charlie gave them. Applaud Colby! If we applaud long enough, maybe he'll get another idea in the fourth season.

La Maison d'Eppes: Larry was playing Archimedes again, to no avail as the water cure didn't solve all his problems, at least that's what he tells Alan. He then goes on to theorize that in his attempts to simplify his life, he's actually made it more complicated. It sounds like the water cure worked after all.

Charlie comes into the bathroom and immediately develops an acute understanding of what his father must've gone through in "Scorched," when Alan walked in on Charlie and Larry in the bathroom. Once he gets over the shock, he gives Dead-Nerd's book of equations to Larry and asks him what it looks like.

The little black book is a smaller version of an exam blue book and somebody's made corrections. That somebody is also very talented in math.

Outside IHOF: Together Liz and Colby dome up with a new witness. The girlfriend, Sherilyn, whose talent lay with computer systems, must be Dead-Nerd's accomplice.

Inside, Don and Liz are letting the track owner, Mr. Connors, sweat it out in an interview room. Colby's managed to get the files from unemployment in less than five days because he let the civil servant hold his "gun." Yeah, I'd usually add a "not like that" here, but I'm not really certain if it would be true.

The files reveal that each of the dead pick six winners talked to Connors, and even some of the big winners, who currently aren't dead, as well. Don's ready to nail Connors with accessory to murder.

With all of the evidence, Connors looks like he wants to confess but is held back by his lawyer, who makes a whole bunch of demands straight out of the "I'm so being paid by a badder ass than this guy" playbook. Once confronted with the evidence and the fact that any jury would convict him in ten minutes, Connors sings like a canary. The lawyer, knowing he's failed hustles his ass out of the country before Tebachian finds him quits representing Connors.

The scheme was to use the pick six sinnings to launder drug money. Liz fills in the rest of the details by adding that their initial connection to the track, a drug dealer from El Salvador, was one of the big winners on the fixed races. Tebachian was laundering their money and paying their taxes; what an honest psychopath. The real victims in all this were Dead-Nerd and his girlfriend.

San Pedro: Colby and Megan find my new apartment the girlfriend's apartment trashed and blood spatter on the kitchen cabinets. Somehow I don't think it was a freak stay-sharp accident.

All the people who were at the racetrack at the beginning of this eppesode must live near Sherilyn because not one of them saw the bad guys carrying out a body in broad daylight. I guess Sherilyn won't be using her math degree from Stanford now, will she?

Liz is all worried about losing yet another witness against Tebachian but it's Colby to the rescue! Dead-Nerd's OTB ticket was cashed.

Motel 666: The OTB traced the claimant of the ticket to an IP address at the hotel. Megan and Colby kick down the door to find Sherilyn hasn't joined her boyfriend in nerd heaven after all. I guess it was just a freak stay-sharp accident.

IHOF: On the menu today, nerd flambe. Interviewing Sherilyn, Megan finds out that she was in on it all along and that the pick six ticket was their way of starting a new life, because being a computer expert in the state with Silicon Valley isn't enough anymore. Sherilyn faked her own death because Tebachian's men came to the house. Megan breaks the bad news to her; Tebachian's men won't be satsified until they have nerd flambe.

Woodbine Racetrack: Don, Liz and Colby try to arrest Tebachian, who is far too busy eating his sea bass to bother with petty annoyances like being arrested by Fedcakes. Tebachian must've been eating some of Dr. Evil's angry sea bass because Liz and Colby take the wind out of Tebachian's men, and Don dumps the sea bass on the table. The sea bass made the Fedcakes very angry.

Tebachian is now in custody but Liz makes the mistake of saying that the Fedcakes have a witness he can't touch. If it were any earlier in the eppesode, we'd have to say RIP to Sherilyn.

Roxy Theatre: Megan and Larry are leaving whatever film they just saw and no, I'm not IMDB'ing it. (Okay, so I couldn't control my curiosity.) The pair have a new schedule called "structured complexity" also known as "almost oxymoronic." It entails dinner and a movie every other Friday, lunch on Wednesday and a wild card once a month. Not what I'd call a relationship but it works for them. Of course, Megan's ready to use her wild card right now, for breakfast, the next morning.

And with that, we fade to black and lets leave those two to whatever your mind can imagine in Larry's '31 Ford. I can assure you though, that if Megan says, "ride 'em cowboy," she's not talking about the horses either.