by SpiderBraids
... the Hyerdahls'. Helga drags Phoebe out of her plan to visit her mom (um... doesn't she live with her [["Phoebe Cheats"]]?) to get her to tutor her for the competition.
And tutor she does, even though it's absolutely taxing on her, trying to tutor a girl who doesn't know a glockenspiel from Dutch cheese, for a competition suited for the likes of Four Eyes. This same girl also believes that:
- Either the Mississippi or the Rio Grande cuts through the Grand Canyon
- The Andes is the tallest mountain in the world
- Jacques Cousteau was the first person to climb Mt. Everest
- Jefferson or Jackson was the first US president to visit the Pacific
We cut to the cafeteria the next day, where Arnold wakes Phoebe up, Four Eyes having nodded off during lunch and screaming Mississippi upon being woken up. All that tutoring is really taking its toll on her. If it were Phoebe competing, she wouldn't be losing sleep since she wouldn't be wasting time on wrong answer after wrong answer, hot dogs, or baseball. Anyways, Footballhead believes he thought Phoebe should have gotten the samurai question (the fact that she has partial Japanese heritage, which surely would have emphasized this, is not mentioned here) and thus the spot, and doesn't really buy her claim that it slipped her mind.
Footballhead and Helga. Arnold reports Phoebe sleeping on her lunch. Helga claims this is a free country (she also defends sleepwalking on the Sunset Arms fire escape in the same manner in ["Helga Sleepwalks"]). Arnold suggests that Four Eyes needs a break. Helga says no she doesn't, and besides she's got more important things, like, you know, winning the contest. Arnold sez "Maybe you should think about what's best for [Phoebe]," before he and his do-goody advice get fobbed off. As Footballhead leaves the cafeteria, Phoebe is sleeping under the flowing spigot of a soft-serve yogurt machine :D Note that Footballhead made absolutely no (explicit) recommendation to Helga about just giving Phoebe the spot. Okay?
Helga's bedroom. Phoebe recycles the Grand Canyon question from the earlier tutoring, and Helga (with a paddleball) actually gets it right with the Colorado. She also correctly identifies Kuala Lumpur as Malaysia's capital, before calling it a night. After all, Helga needs her shut-eye, because... "I wouldn't wanna nod off when they announce that I've won the All-City." Four Eyes kinda reflects that sentiment, and asks if she has a conscience, and, well, second thoughts. "Second thoughts? Don't waste your time." Funny coming from someone who will turn out to have wasted her tutoring time for nothing. Ooh, spoilage. Anyways, see you bright and early, Phoebe.