Tonight’s new episode of Bunheads, “I’ll Be Your Meyer Lansky”, saw the return of one of Michelle and Fanny’s most dreaded mutual enemies: their accountant, Eric (Ron Butler). Though they ostensibly “run” a dance studio as an awkward partnership, neither of them is big on bookkeeping, finances, profit margins, simple math, or numbers in general. Consequently, the studio is tanking hard, thanks to the Nutcracker fundraiser disaster, Fanny’s reluctance to bill many of her poorer students, and both instructors’ penchant for canceling classes on a whim and/or plot device.

Presumably before Hubbell’s death he managed his own money as well as his mother’s studio, but apparently didn’t leave her enough of a fortune to fund it on auto-pilot in perpetuity. Eric’s base-level fiduciary jargon reminds me of my day job, but is useless against a pair of flighty dance instructors, even though they prefaced their office visit with several rounds of energy drinks and a dedicated physical training montage set to faux-Rocky fanfare. Had they spent their formative years double-majoring, they wouldn’t be in this mess or, one hopes, overdosing on Red Bull. As it is, the best business proposition they can muster is a shaky plan involving a donkey, a sluice box (or “sluicer” in Michellespeak), and some gold in them thar hills.

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