Saturday Night Live Transcripts
Season 2: Episode 3
76c: Eric Idle / Joe Cocker, Stuff
Pong
…..Al Franken
…..Tom Davis
[ open on Pong video screen, as Al Franken and Tom Davis speak from offscreen ]
Al Franken: Aw, nuts! It always seems like I fall behind at the beginning, and then I never catch up.
Tom Davis: Yeah, I know.
Al Franken: Well, there’s one, right through a hole.
Tom Davis: Hey, how’d you do on that Math Psy. quickie quiz today?
Al Franken: Oh, I passed.. I got a D-. How’d you do?
Tom Davis: I aced it.
Al Franken: You know, it always seems like you never study, and then you always get an A. How you do that?
Tom Davis: Well, you just tell the teacher what you know, not what you don’t know.
Al Franken: Well.. what do you mean? I don’t understand..
Tom Davis: Well, for example, on that barometer question, you remember, you’re given a barometer and you have to determine the height of a tall building?
Al Franken: Yeah.. I left that one blank. I forgot what a barometer is.
Tom Davis: Oh, well, that’s for measuring barometric pressure. So, to get the answer to that question, you get the barometric pressure then you go to the bottom of the building, and you take the difference between the two barometric pressures and you plug it into a formula.
Al Franken: [ pause ] Oh, yeah..
Tom Davis: Well, I forgot what the formula was, but I didn’t want Professor Heimitz to know, so I gave him several other solutions I figured out.
Al Franken: Oh, yeah?
Tom Davis: Yeah. I said, take the barometer up on top of the building, drop it off of the building, time how long it takes before it gets to the ground, and then plug it into that formula we learned in high school for falling bodies? You know, Distance = 16 x the time in seconds square? Remember all that?
Al Franken: [ pause ] Yeah..
Tom Davis: Or, I said, on a sunny day you can set up the barometer, measure the shadow of the building, and set up a ratio. You know how to get the answer there.
Al Franken: [ pause ] Yeah.
Tom Davis: Or, get this – get the circumference of the barometer, wrap string around it, then drop it off the top of the building, count how many revolutions the barometer makes before it hits the ground, then take the number of revolutions and multiply it times the circumference.
Al Franken: [ pause ] The.. the circumference?
Tom Davis: Right. Or, get this, this is the last one – I said, go in the basement, find the superintendent and offer to exchange the barometer for the information. How’s that? I got full credit on that question.
Al Franken: Well.. you should have.. you knew all the answers. [ as he loses at Pong ] Nuts!
