The Fake Date

The Fake Date is the 11th episode of the series. It aired on Teletoon in Canada on January 16, 2005, and remains unaired in the United States. Despite this, it was briefly available for viewing on the Cartoon Network website. When Jen finds herself unable to get the attention of a coworker she likes, Caitlin suggests that she find a fake date and take him to the Penalty Box's annual staff party in order to make her real crush jealous. Meanwhile, Jonesy starts writing a book about how to score women.

Main Plot
Jen is at work but not working efficiently, as every time she tries to work she soon finds herself distracted by thoughts of her cute new co-worker. Coach Halder notices this, and assigns her push-ups for love on the job, but even the threat of push-ups is not enough to deter Jen, as she soon goes over and invites Charlie Dobbs out for coffee with her. When Charlie begins to reject the offer, though, Jen cuts him off in the middle of his explanation and heads off to do work elsewhere.

Despite being rejected, Jen still has the hots for Charlie, as Caitlin is quick to notice when she walks into the store later that day. While Jen is able to keep Caitlin from blurting it out in the middle of the store, when Jen comes to the Big Squeeze later that day Caitlin is enthused by the idea of discussing Jen's romantic prospects. Jen is not so delighted, however, as she has had no luck at getting Charlie to notice her. Upon hearing this, Jonesy makes a suggestion: he'll accompany Jen to the Penalty Box and feed her lines that are certain to get Charlie's attention.

Jen agrees to this, and soon she's inside the Penalty Box while Jonesy watches from outside and talks to Jen through a headset. While Jen initially gets off to a good start, soon Jonesy's editorializing causes problems, and Charlie ends up confused as to what Jen is trying to communicate. To make matters worse, Coach Halder soon walks up with a headset on and reveals that he's heard the entire conversation between Jonesy and Jen.

When Jen comes back to her friends, she tells Nikki that Nikki was right about not listening to Jonesy, and then reveals the biggest reason that she's disappointed: she wanted Charlie to take her to the Penalty Box's staff party, which is coming up the next night. Upon hearing this, Caitlin suggests that Jen bring a fake date in order to make Charlie Dobbs jealous. Jen is intrigued by this idea, and when Caitlin points out that the Penalty Box has the best staff party in the mall, she realizes that it won't be hard to find a fake date.

Soon, there are a long line of guys outside of the Big Squeeze, all of whom are looking to date Jen. Caitlin will conduct the interviews, while Jen will watch and listen from afar in order to find a winner. Jonesy is the first guy up, and flunks out of his interview quickly when he admits that he'd give up on Jen if he saw a cute girl alone at the party. After this, Darth walks up and is immediately rejected on the basis of looks. Wyatt then arrives with a coffee for Caitlin, but swiftly disqualifies himself when he complains about Caitlin's taste in coffee and unwillingness to let her listen to a song he's been working on.

As the line moves on, nobody good comes up–until Jude comes up and impresses Jen and Caitlin by pouring Caitlin a glass of lemonade and then giving her a massage. Upon seeing how considerate Jude can be, Jen declares him the winner and decides to take him to the Penalty Box's staff party. However, once there Jen turns into a horrible date, bossing him around and focusing more on whether Charlie is paying attention to her than on actually having fun with her ostensible date.

Naturally, this leaves Jude disappointed with the experience, and he starts to partake of the free energy drinks the Penalty Box has supplied. This ends up with him bouncing off the walls of the Penalty Box, and eventually he happens upon a tennis ball shooter. Intrigued, he turns it on, and the machine fires tennis balls through the store, causing chaos and the destruction of the night's big giveaway.

Jen dumps him in response, but when cleaning up the store later, her friends point out that the chaos was her fault. Jen relents, and decides to make things up to Jude for being such a bad date. The next day, she starts by getting Jude a taco from Wonder Taco, but after she gives the taco to Jude she spots Charlie. Fed up, she decides to go ask point-blank why Charlie doesn't want her, but when she goes up to see him, she notices a black-haired girl on his arm whom Charlie introduces as his girlfriend. After hearing this, Jen happily goes back to her friends, overjoyed that Charlie just had a girlfriend–until she starts to wonder what Jill had going for her that Jen doesn't.

Sub-Plot: Jonesy's Book
The group are gathered around the table when Nikki notices that Jonesy is typing stuff on his laptop. When pressed, Jonesy tells his friends the big news: his new job at Booktropolis has inspired him to write a book of his own about how to score chicks. While Nikki doesn't take Jonesy's posturing seriously, Jen is in desperate need of help when it comes to getting a date with Charlie, and asks Jonesy to help her.

Jonesy and Jen end up failing at this task, and when they come back Caitlin suggests a fake date. After Jonesy fails to pass the audition, he points out that what happened mirrors a line from a movie: "You picked the wrong guy." Nikki disagrees with him, however, both about Jude being the wrong guy and about the line, because she believes that the line is "You kicked the thong guy."

To settle this question, Jonesy and Nikki go to the movies to figure out what it actually was. When the line comes up, however, Jonesy is in the bathroom, so he doesn't hear that the line is indeed "You kicked the thong guy." Despite missing the line, Jonesy has a good time at the movie, and is happy when leaving with Nikki in direct contrast to Nikki's disappointment about not having proved Jonesy wrong. When the duo get to the elevator, though, they begin to fight over pressing buttons–until their faces get very close and they smile at each other.

Suddenly, though, the elevator breaks, and the duo are trapped. They spend a lot of time trapped, enough so that Jonesy's claustrophobia sets in. Eventually, however, Ron frees them from the elevator, and Jonesy happily promises the security guard two chapters in his book. The next day, he writes the story down as part of the last chapter, with him taking special care to make Nikki come off as a total babe.

Quotes
Charlie: (with a mannequin's crotch pressed against his) It's not what it looks like! Caitlin: It's exactly what it looks like! Nikki: Chapter 5: Avoiding the Author. Nikki: In a trainwreck kind of way. Jen: I'm not blowing it! Charlie: Blowing what? Jen: Nothing! Um– Coach Halder: Masterson! Nikki: Aw, there there. I'm sure all the chapters in your book will be awkward and painful. Jonesy: This reminds me of the movie, Kung-Fu Cop Partners: "You just picked the wrong guy." Nikki: No, you idiot, he said "You just kicked the thong guy." Jonesy: I saw the movie, and he said, "You picked the wrong guy!" Nikki: I saw the movie too and he said, "You kicked the thong guy!" Wyatt: (sarcastically) I saw the movie and he said, "Get a life!"
 * Caitlin: I know what's going on here!
 * Jonesy: Chapter 4: Avoiding the Parents.
 * Caitlin: This should be interesting.
 * Jonesy: (through his headset to Jen) Don't blow it!
 * Jonesy: This will make for a very painful, awkward chapter in my book.
 * Movie Cop: You kicked the thong guy.

Trivia
Reason for firing: Unknown.
 * Jonesy's job: employee at Booktropolis
 * This episode was made available on Cartoon Network's website between October 5th and October 19th in 2009, but never aired in the USA. On a related note, this episode was banned from airing on Cartoon Network due to suggestive dialogue.
 * The jackets from "The Five Finger Discount" reappear in this episode.
 * Jonesy remarks upon reading The Cat in the Hat, a famous book by Dr. Seuss.
 * This is the first time two characters (Jonesy and Nikki, in this case) get stuck in an elevator. The second time occurs in "Labour Day," with Jen and Nathan.
 * This is the first appearance of Jill.
 * Nikki claims to have a nephew in this episode, all-but-explicitly stating that she has a sibling (specifically an older sibling who has at least one child of their own). However, later episodes in the series (such as the series finale), imply that Nikki's an only child like Caitlin is.
 * Jonesy has revealed in this episode that he has claustrophobia (fear of being in confined spaces), when he and Nikki got trapped in the elevator. His fear would occur again in "Snow Job".