Sit Boo-Boo, Sit

Tonight I walked into the award-winning Family Ties episode in which Alex is talking to the therapist; surely one of the all-time scenes in sitcom history. Him realizing the therapist went to Grant College and knocking him:

PSYCHIATRIST: What attitude?
ALEX: You know what attitude. I'm gonna sit here, I'm gonna do all the talking, I'm gonna pour my guts out, and you're just gonna sit back there silently and be God huh? Pretend you don't know anything. [looks at the diplomas] Wait a minute, you went to Grant College?
PSYCHIATRIST: That's right.
ALEX: Maybe you weren't pretending. Maybe you really don't know anything.
ALEX: You know what's bothering me? I mean really, really bothering me? Something I am having a very hard time getting past.
PSYCHIATRIST: What's that?
ALEX: I'm paying you for this! I'm paying you to sit there and listen to me. I'm paying a guy from Grant College to sit and listen to my life stories and give me advice Grant College -- the school that gives a course in opening umbrellas.
PSYCHIATRIST: [long pause] I got an A in that.

His faking sick to get outta school stuff, his wanting to stay home from the second grade to watch the John Deane hearings, his ability to name coins by sound as they hit the floor, his legend in the 2nd grade classroom:

GREG: I know who you are -- you're Alex Keaton, the kid who knows everything.
ALEX: Who told you that? Did Mrs. Leahy say that?
GREG: No, the other kids were saying it. They say it's great here all you have to do is just keep quiet, sooner or later Keaton rattles off the answer. How come you know so much?
ALEX: I take some night classes...Ohio State.

And then of course the biggest laugh, answering the question re: does he believe in God:

ALEX: The analytical side of me says no. On a straight cost-efficiency basis you can't prove it. There's no annual report. There's no pictures of the board of directors. I mean recent ones.

Of course mostly I'm thinking about all this because of the line:

ALEX: Strange thing about memory. Sometimes they can be more real than what we think of as reality.

Which is obviously straight from Proust; that line is the entire raison d'etre of Remembrance of Things Past,  of which I've personally felt the taste.

Here's the final 10 minutes of the episode (shown commercial free, if I recall.) Sigh. Now THAT was a great sitcom.