The Rothman Disintegration

The Rothman Disintegration is the seventeenth episode of the fifth season of the CBS sitcom, The Big Bang Theory. The episode first aired on February 16, 2012.

Summary
Sheldon and his rival Kripke fight it out over an available new office. Penny gets a gift from Amy that really tests their freindship.

Extended Plot
The retirement of Professor Rothman opens up an office that both Sheldon and Kripkewanttomoveinto. The university president makes them settle it between themselves. After they can not agree on a competitive game, the gang ends up in a gymnasium. Unfortunately, both Sheldon and Kripke are both equally bad at sports and neither of them win until they have a ball bouncing contest which Sheldon wins. Typically, Sheldon is thrilled with his latest acquisition until the air conditioning is too cold because the professor in the neighboring office is having hot flashes, the upstairs geology department is too noisy, and a bird is "completely out-of-tune" with the wind chimes. Finally, his curiosity gets the better of him and he gets his head stuck in a hole in the wall, which Leonard photographs before he goes for help. Meanwhile, Penny receives a gift from Amy, a large painting of the two of them that is not flattering and very ugly. Amy finds that after she visited, Penny took it down. Crushed, Amy takes it back. Then Penny rushes over to Amy's apartment to save their friendship and takes the painting back after claiming that Bernadette was jealous over it. Now it hangs on the virtual wall of her apartment and it is no longer seen by the studio audience.

Quotes
Sheldon (referring a urinal): Kripke!

Kripke: Yes?

Sheldon: You're in my spot.

Bernadette: ''Look at that face! That enormous, unsettling, CRAZY face!''

Penny: Is there any chance that I'll learn to love it?

Bernadette: ''That depends. Do you like pictures of yourself where you look like a man?''

Sheldon: ''And let him win? Do I look crazy to you?''

Leonard: ''Alright, this is one-on-one. First person to five wins. Any questions? (Sheldon raises his hand) Yes, Sheldon?''

Sheldon: Five what?

Sheldon: ''Use the Force, Sheldon! (throws the basketball, but it does not even reach the height of the hoop) I may need more Force!''

Sheldon: ''I see no other option but to challenge you to a duel. I'd smack you with a glove, but just last week, I packed away my winter things.''

Raj: ''I'm glad that men are wearing hats again. They're so distinguished.''

Amy: ''Before I met you, I was a mousy wallflower. But look at me now. I'm like some kind of downtown hipster party girl! With a posse, a boyfriend, and a new lace bra that hooks in the front of all things!''

Bernadette: Too bad you're not as strong as the dude in the painting.

Raj: ''Would you look at this? I pay 25 dollars to some kid on E-Bay for a handcrafted Harry Potter wand - he sent me a stick. He went into his backyard and picked up a stick.''

Howard: It's numbered.

Raj: Ooh, limited edition, nice!

Sheldon: ''We're gonna work this office situation out like gentleman. And if that doesn't work, I'm gonna poison his tea.''

Note:

 * Title Reference: The title refers to the collapse of Professor Rothman's mental state.

Trivia

 * When Sheldon first moves into his new office, Professor Rothman is present behind the door reading an issue of the Journal of Physics G: Nuclear and Particle Physics.
 * The "Rock, Paper, Scissors, Lizard, Spock" game appears again, which is a game that was last seen in season two, in the episode The Lizard-Spock Expansion, and mentioned by Howard in the late second season episode The Hofstadter Isotope.
 * The basketball contest scene is similar to the wrestling scene in The Alien Parasite Hypothesis, and takes place in the same sports hall.
 * Sheldon even has a spot in the men's restroom; the right hand urinal.
 * This is the first time Star Trek: Voyager has been mentioned in the show. It is odd that it hasn't been mentioned previously, given that co-creator Bill Prady used to work on the show.
 * Sheldon was sad to know that Kripke didn't view him as a friend, which clashes with what happened in season 2, The Friendship Algorithm, where he acknowledged Kripke couldn't be his friend, as he has no more spots left.
 * At the end of the episode you see Penny hanging an empty frame facing the camera. Even though Penny chose to hang the picture in her apartment and will always see it, it was hung on the open virtual wall of her apartment set, where it won't be seen by the audience except in certain circumstances (such as the scene in The Countdown Reflection where the painting is visible over Amy's shoulder as she talks to Howard through Penny's partially open apartment door).
 * Professor Rothman may have retired, but he is still hanging around the university without clothes.

Songs
John Travolta, Olivia Newton-John - "We Go Together" from movie "Grease".

Source

 * Press release from spoilertv.com