Tonight’s season 9, episode 11 of How I Met Your Mother, “Bedtime Stories,” was told entirely in rhyme, and we hope you enjoy this sad attempt to copy. If not, we’re so sorry. The recap will be less rhyme-y.

Well, after 30 minutes of rhymes it was honestly hard to not think in rhyming fashion, and we think it’s safe to say this was one of the most ambitious episodes we’ll see from How I Met Your Mother.

There wasn’t really anything special, plot-wise, to note about “Bedtime Stories,” and if it weren’t entertaining to listen to, it’d be as boring and filler-episode-esque as they come. Beyond that, we wonder what motivated the writers to create this HIMYM episode. Was it one of the many “it’s the last season, why not?” hail mary throws we’ve seen this season so far?

Basically, Marshall is on a bus with Marvin and trying to get him to sleep, but when he realizes he lost his rhyming book, he begins to tell his son stories of his friends, and so, the episode was split up into three featurettes (or are they vignettes?).

Mosby at the Bat

Ted is in the middle of a dry spell, and when a new TA at his college asks him out, the gang tries to determine if it is or is not a date. This discussion includes Barney holding a globe with the ‘international date line,’ green means date, red means not a date. The dinner continuously fluctuates between the two and in the end, Ted’s determination to find out which Yankee baseball player she dated.

Robin Takes the Cake

We’ve seen Robin at her lowest before, but this might’ve taken the cake (heh) for her most desperate and sad. After breaking up with one of her many past suitors, she runs into ex-Canadian boyfriend, Simon, (James Van Der Beek) in a bakery only to learn he’s there to pick up his wedding cake.

So what does she do? What any self-respecting woman would do: she steals the cake and begins to eat it at Ted’s apartment. She wants to quit after eating half but as Lily explains, the day would be known as the day she quit, she gave up, so instead she should finish the whole thing just to prove she can. Cue: Barney making the event a party, Robin finishing the cake, going on to do a keg stand… and then being taken to the hospital to get her stomach pumped.

Barney Stinson: Player King of New York City

Not much came out of this featurette beyond our concern for Barney’s new level of narcissism and possible multiple personality disorder. After realizing Barney slept with a woman in the East Village – outside his West Village boundary, he tries to smooth over the ruffled feathers of the members of the Players club.

All different men, all played by Neil Patrick Harris, there’s Pickle Jar Bob who claimed Brooklyn women, Captain Bill has Queens, Tuxedo Bob, the East Side, and so on. To get out of trouble, Barney decides to poison them all, which is obviously realistic.

Marshall really is doing everything he can to get to his best friend’s wedding, and it’s been sweet to see how hard he tries to get back, but now it’s getting old and we just want to see the gang reunited at this point.

MVP of the week: Gus

It may be a technicality, but HIMYM unrealistically didn’t actually have any problems with the rhyming. When Marshall couldn’t think of what to say next, at one point, his bus buddy, Gus, gets him out of trouble and raps some spoken word and then figuratively drops the mic. We can’t believe Marshall would’ve ever wanted to end a sentence with ‘orange,’ but that’s what happens when writers can work on a script for days at a time.

Nevertheless, Gus’ presence this episode provided an entertaining voice and character for Marshall to bounce off of.

There was no real plot in “Bedtime Stories,” beyond sharing a few untold stories about the gang’s adventures. We can also gather that by the way Ted refers of Marvin as his kid’s “cousin Marvin,” we can assume Ted, Marshall and Lily are still close enough to consider each other family in nearly twenty years time.

Were you looking forward to a Slapsgiving episode to celebrate the holiday? Co-creator Craig Thomas say never fear.

Next week, Marshall will begin his hitchhiking journey to the Farhamton Inn, five miles away. With a baby and some belongs (we presume), there’s no way that can go wrong.

Did you enjoy tonight’s episode, or was the rhyming too distracting for you?