Since the invention of the kiss there have been five kisses that were rated the most passionate, the most pure....

Some awesome kisses:

And to these we add the newest Entry Into The Pantheon:

I honestly have to give credit to the writers on The Big Bang Theory. Character development on this show tends to proceed at a pretty glacial pace, to the point where often there's quite a lot of tension just from the standpoint of thinking "Wow, they have to do something soon, right?" Howard got married a couple years back, but everyone else is in kinda-limbo. Sheldon and Amy keep on plugging, with Sheldon completely unaware of Amy's increasing need for physical sensation; Leonard and Penny keep plugging along in a relationship that persists despite a seeming utter lack of anything in common; Raj keeps plugging along in...well, that's wrong. Raj isn't plugging along at all.

But then, after a fight during a "romantic dinner" on a train -- which Amy arranged because Sheldon is a train nut -- Sheldon mocks Amy, asking if she wants to do various "romantic" things, such as "gazing into each other's eyes". ("You blinked, I win!") But when Sheldon says, "Hey, kissing is romantic, let's do that!", he plants a not-terribly-nicely-intended kiss on Amy's lips...and then...he holds it. And moves in closer. And puts his hands on her hips. And holds the kiss a bit longer. And notes, afterwards, "That was nice", and invites her to the locomotive to fulfill an invitation the engineer gave him.

I may be frustrated by the slow way the characters unfold on Big Bang Theory, but the show is still hilarious and mostly warm in its humor (I could do with a bit less geek-bashing), and these writers cannot ever be accused of not knowing their characters. They came up with perhaps the only possible way Sheldon Cooper could ever voluntarily kiss a girl for the first time. What a great moment!

Now, Sheldon and sex? I suspect we're still a good four seasons away from that.

(By the way, I was just randomly thinking up great kisses off the top of my head for a few minutes. Which ones did I miss? Consider this a Random Tuesday Conversation Starter!)