Beauty and the Freakonomics - January 3

Bring on the Beauties and Herd up the Geeks. It’s time for season 3 of the cross-cultural experiment and this time there promise to be some great twists. How different are the pairs this year? Let’s look and see…

It’s arrival day and the geeks are arriving at the mansion on scooters.

Some quick intro facts

Scooter is a Harvard Grad obsessed with quantum physics

Piao has kissed a single girl,

Drew is a trekkie who thinks beautiful girls are a different species

Niels has a 1600 SAT, who thinks he is smarter than 99.99% of Americans

Matt is an M.I.T. student who thinks his probability of getting laid is 2 to the -52 power

Mario has a tattoo of a Nintendo controller and has 25000 comic books

Nate is the lead singer of a star wars tribute band

Sanjay is listed as our poor virgin who doesn’t understand people who don’t know about Linux

All of these geeks are welcomed to the mansion and as soon as they are inside, the limos pull up with beauties in tow.

Jenny Lee thinks it is easy to be her since she is pretty. She’s also a UFC ring girl

Andrea is a competitive beauty queen

Erin is a voice teacher who can’t believe anyone actually goes to Harvard

Tori is a self admitted self centered model

Nadia is a lifetime cheerleader and sorority girl

Sheree is a hooters waitress whose last read book is Sweet Valley High

Cecille is a bikini model who says her best feature is her ability to pout

Megan is a playboy model who was bad in high school but great in nail school


And now it is time to make team selections the groups pass each other as they head into their respective rooms. The girls are beside themselves. They had no clue that the guys would be sooooo geeky.

Drew goes first and finds that the ladies backs are to him. The groups will not be able to look at each other during selections. He talks about his study of business, his Excel knowledge and his devotion to being a Trekkie and Erin asks what his favorite Adjective is. Drew balks and then says fantastic and that made up Erin’s mind. We have team number 1. They rush upstairs to find the best room and Andrea heads over to the guys.

Andrea says she wants the other half of the winning team. She is asked which team she would choose, the Lakers or the Clippers, and she didn’t know there were two teams in L.A.
Regardless, Matt likes her and we have team number 2.

Sanjay heads to the girls and does some imitations… of household appliances. He does a blender and the girls are appalled. Tori thought it was funny and went to make a match. Sanjay is sure that Tori can’t be real, and worse yet that the “twins can’t be real.

Cecille heads over and is asked if she is more of a red state or a blue state. She says that she lives in CA so she is more of a golden state. Ouch, nobody seems to want her and Nate offers to be the pariah.

Mario heads to the ladies and talks about his masters in theology. The ladies have no questions and no one wants Mario. He can hear their discussion and is hurt, but eventually Nadia succumbs to peer pressure and joins the Nintendo plumber.

Jenny Lee heads over and says she is an expert in things she knows. Yeah… Niels joins her to form a team.

Scooter mentions that his nickname comes from the Muppet babies and the girls want to know if he can give a decent backrub. He says “sure,” and Megan is his.

Saving the best for last Piao and Sheree are a couple.

As the pairs unpack we learn that Tori has much to teach. She asks Sanjay what “booty” is and he can only think of a pirate’s treasure. She is shocked he doesn’t know the other meaning and worse yet, when they pose the question to two other geeks, they fare no better. Yeesh.

Challenge 1. The girls will have to find 3 books using the Dewey decimal system and each book will contain a social task. The first geek to complete all 3 tasks will win immunity for his team.

The girls struggle big time, but none of them are giving up. The quote of the day seems to be, “My book is not here.

Cecille is first and delivers the books we find out that the 3 tasks are to get suntan lotion rubbed on your back, to borrow a cell phone to make a call and to get a girl’s phone number. Nate is off to the races

2nd is Andrea and 3rd is Nadia. So Matt and Mario hit the streets to play catch up.

Nate finally gets someone to help with the suntan lotion and now hold the lead.

Meanwhile back in the library, everyone has finished aside from Sanjay and Tori

Tori has broken down into tears, but continues to look. Sanjay tells her that it is time for some mental toughness.

Tori does find the last book and now all the geeks are out on the street.

Unfortunately this has become a 2 horse race between Nate and Scooter who have both gotten girl’s phone numbers. It comes down to the last task, and Cecille is going to be a happy girl. Nate just called the host, Mike, and they have won.

Back at the mansion, the teams are notified that there is not going to be an elimination tonight. Instead the only way someone will leave, is by choice. They are going to be made an offer later and if they take it they may have to go.

The teams go upstairs to discuss the new situation and Erin is conflicted. She works 3 jobs and just financially could use the money.

Andrea is attacking Matt for his lack of effort during the first challenge. Hence she says that she is likely to take the money and that Matt is hopeless.

The teams come back downstairs. And the offers are made.

Anyone willing to leave for $5,000

Nope.

$10,000

$15,000

$20,000!

Andrea and Erin are feeling the heat.

And $20,000 is the final offer. Will anyone take it? Nope. Mike takes the offer off the table, but Andrea asks him to wait one more minute.

She discusses it with Matt, but they decide to stay in the game.

The teams are now given the rest of the evening off and that means Cecille gets to use Matt as a makeup palette.

Cecille escorts Matt downstairs to show off her work and the entire group feels as if she has demeaned him. Matt sees it as him getting to spend time with a girl, but to each their own.

The next morning it’s time for the new challenge.

The guys will have to perform stand up comedy and the girls will have to hold a conversation on current events.

Andrew is up first and gets a case of the umms. And that’s about all he’s got

Scooter however has a complete routine planned, but it is way over the heads of his audience.

Piao decides to take the vulgar route and asks him if he has tasted any good cat lately? (In other words…) Yeah, crash and burn.

Nate gets up there and so far is the only one who nailed a routing taking about how allergies should be more useful (We should all be allergic to sharks).

Matt goes with classic jokes and does pretty well.

Niels gets up and makes some boob jokes and also succeeds. JennyLee is impressed.

Sanjay has a tough time and likens his comedy to watching his parents have sex. Ouch.

Mario gets up and delivers a Nintendo routine where a girl breaks his joystick and kills, but is it enough to win.

Nope. Nate takes it. So, let’s see. Cecille and Nate have won 2 challenges in a row. That’s immunity and the right to send one team to the elimination room. This could spell trouble.

Now to the ladies. In their study materials, the girls were given a book called Freakonomics. The girls will now have to do an on camera interview with one of the books authors.

There is nothing to watch here. Only one girl does moderately well and that is Sheree, who legitimately might be good enough to handle a newscast. It’s a hands down victory.

With that choices need to be made. Nate and Cecille choose to send Sanjay and Tori to elimination and Sheree and Piao send Erin and Drew

The Elimination

The girls will be quizzed first. The team with the most points (maximum 4) will stay in the mansion

Tori will receive the first question.

In what year is the next U.S Presidential election scheduled to occur? Tori says November of 2006 and bombs. It’s 2008

Erin is asked what Japan’s unit of currency is called and answers Yen. That’s worth 1 point

Tori is then shown a picture of a location and asked for its name given the initial NYSE. She has no guess. It’s the New York Stock Exchange

Erin is then asked for one of the co-authors of Freakonomics. She answers Steven Levitt and now has 2 points. (Also Stephen Dubner)

As we switch, this puts the guys in sudden death. Sanjay must answer correctly to stay in the game.

Sanjay is asked what sitcom is inspired by the childhood experiences of Chris Rock. He guesses growing up with Chris. Correct Answer: Everybody hates Chris.

With that, Tori and Sanjay are done at the mansion.

Erin and Drew have won the right to stay. Will they come back with a vengeance next time? Can the juggernaut of Cecille and Nate be stopped? More importantly, can these pairs become more than just beauties and geeks?