You Probably Think This Song is About You - 
by Kat
Alrighty, this was good TV! It flowed, it ebbed, it entertained. House is shaping up to be quality television. Not necessarily heart pumping or laffs-a-minute, but they do good work with a small cast and limited scope. It all comes down to the writing, I think, and the actors get some great lines. But there’s a reason I’m not a television writer – I can’t even think of a good name for the special effect they do where they swoosh into the body to show what gross stuff is making the patient sick. I asked for a name for House’s minions and got Outhouses – who wants to name the special effects inside the body?
So there’s a kid’s talent show in progress, and I’m in panic mode because I can’t handle the sick kids stories, especially when I’ve got PMS. Two adorable but kind of bratty girls are getting helped into their dresses by their mom and complaining about homemade outfits and rich kids who make fun of them. The mom says she’ll just key the mean girl’s dad’s car, so now I know that it’s her that’s sick. Because I’m in love with her now. Sure enough, while the girls are performing she starts screaming in agony, and the Medic-Cam goes into her stomach and shows a vessel getting redder and bigger. Thank god we didn’t actually see it pop; I’d have to take to my bed for the next year.
Back at the hospital Cuddy accosts Stacy about some disciplinary hearing that Chase and House have to go to. I have no idea what it’s in reference to, but later we see they’re doing this episode in reverse. We know from the last episode that Stacy wants nothing to do with House ever again, but Cuddy isn’t in the loop on that yet. Stacy explains that they had a fight and that Cuddy needs to find a different lawyer for House. Cuddy’s response is the apt “40 percent of our lawsuits last year were about House. If you can’t work with him you can’t work here.” I find Cuddy most appealing when she’s being vaguely threatening. It makes me uneasy, but in a hot kind of way.
More back and forth between House and Wilson about the ethics of House reading Stacy’s file. It could be boring since they essentially keep having this discussion, but this is why this show is so good: the guys have set up a field goal made out of paper clips and are concentrating just as hard on the game as on the discussion. I think this series will end with Wilson and House walking off into the sunset with each other.
Stacy interrupts playtime to throw some legal documents in House’s face. She makes him sign them and says there’s nothing he has to know about them. In the next scene, she’s carefully and hilariously going over the same documents with Chase. She genuinely wants to help him, but he’s got that rich boy arrogance in full effect, so she basically goes over a script with him that outlines everything he should say to the committee. And here we have this episode’s main conceit.
Foreman initially saw the patient first, in the clinic while her brother paced and said insulting things while Foreman tried to do his job. He noticed that her eye was inflamed, which is a very bad sign indicating potential blindness. However, since inflamed eye plus stomach and leg pain is weird, House was on it. This is, allegedly, a good thing.
There’s a funny sequence where House is discussing her symptoms while struggling to open his bottle of Vicodin. He throws it Chase for him to open, and we hear Stacy in a voiceover interrupt: “Don’t care about the Vicodin.” The bottle disappears with a little pop. This show is at its best when not taking itself too seriously.
Chase tells Stacy that he was sent off to give the patient an oral and pelvic exam. When Stacy questions why Chase was assigned to Foreman’s patient, the story is rewritten to show that Foreman went to see the patient right as Chase opened the bottle and Vicodin went flying everywhere. Do not mess with House’s fun pills. Chase is punished by being sent off to do the pelvic.
In the exam room, Chase asks the woman if she’s in any pain. She’s lying there with both hands covering her face and only nods in response, practically unable to talk. To all the guys out there: this is a completely accurate representation of the pelvic exam experience. In case you were wondering.
Chase reminds her that it’s better if she talks and tries to distract herself with conversation. This is true. Chase learns that they have the same family history: dad left, mom became a drug addict and died. Stacy appears in the room asking how this is relevant. Hee! Back in her office, she tells Chase not to manipulate the panel with this bonding stuff, but that at the same time this same bonding stuff is why he hasn’t been sued by the patient. Hmm, a small hint. We still don’t know exactly what’s going on here. You know what? These scenes with Stacy and Chase were spliced together from many different takes. Her lipstick is a different shade in every shot.
Chase saw that he gave her a skin test without actually scheduling a follow-up visit, but that she showed up the next day and found him in a lobby. He looked at her arm right there and determined from the pustules that she had a very treatable disease, and told her to make an appointment with the specialist. I believe the saying is “can’t see the forest for the trees,” and Chase is falling victim to that right now, because the women looks like shit. Pale, drawn, fatigued-looking.
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