House: The Devil Wears Ann Taylor

OK, so has everyone recovered from last week’s downer yet? Ready to get back to normal, like Cuddy after that baby incident? Fox’s website has already taken off its black armband, so maybe we can move on with our lives too. Let’s find out how the docs are dealing, hmm?

Oops, I lied. First let’s check in on a couple of protesters chained to a dump truck singing “This Land Is Your Land”. There is the usual light banter between the neo-hippies (all in faux-lotus position of course) and the miners who can’t get in to do their job, and then a woman protester passes out. She has no pulse. Protest over. Could it be that easy? For the miners yes, for us no. She was just dehydrated, but the guy next to her loses his balance when trying to stand up. That’s right, it’s another POW Fakeout! And it’s on my Bingo card! Ah, he probably just got a head rush. It happens when you get up quickly after sitting in one position for a while. Especially when you’re chained to one spot.

Happens to me at work all the time.

The House of Pain is down one doctor now, so that should mean more screen time for the 1.0 Houseguests, right? Right! Whether that’s a good thing is TBD. Cameron is making Chase postpone their vacation “by a couple of days” because she owes a doctor at another hospital a favor, and she’s going to pull some strings to get his patient (the protester, no doubt) in to see House. The strings in question are probably metaphorical, but after her history with House, you never know. Chase wants to know why handing House a file will take a couple of days. Cameron is still a terrible liar, but Chase is still a little girl, so it evens out.

Cameron takes the file upstairs to Mission Control, where the main topic of interest is Cameron trying to sneak her way back on the team. 13 calls the incoming POW a nutcase and says his problem is probably courtesy of a toxic waste dump. Didn’t expect that sort of ultra-right-wing Earth-hater attitude coming from her, didja? I bet we haven’t heard the last of that. She may even do some teabagging next week. Louie thinks the POW fakes his Captain Planet schtick “to get his hybrid waxed by girls who care about the environment”. Cameron wants to know why he’d ask to be seen “by the best diagnostician in the country” if he was a faker. House: “Now who’s trying to get their hybrid waxed?” House sends Cameron to do the first pointless test. Convenient, that. So sorry, Chase.

The test turns out to be squirting ice water into the patient’s inner ear. I don’t care what you say about neti pots, that sounds really icky. The POW complains about the commercially-grown non-organic flowers on his bedside table, then barfs on Cameron’s gown. Meanwhile, House breaks the news about Cameron to Wilson over chow in the cafeteria. “Cameron is happy in the ER. There’s no way she wants her nose back on your grindstone.” I wish Wilson would make House work a little harder for the one-liners every now and then. That was an easy setup. House wonders why Wilson’s eating healthy this morning. “I’m just not in the mood for bacon,” he says. Wait, what? Who’s ever not in the mood for bacon?

The 2.0 Houseguests are up in the conference room gossiping nervously about Cameron. Speak of the Devil, and she appears.

And the Devil wears Ann Taylor.

She tells them that the puking ruled out Diagnosis #1. Louie thinks the POW is still faking. House points out that Cameron changed her shoes, and if he was faking, he would’ve avoided puking on them. So House has still got game. House sends Cameron off to check for Diagnosis #2, whatever it is, and the 2.0 Houseguests go play foosball or something. The POW is hiccuping like crazy, which is an awesomely flimsy excuse for Cameron to postpone vacation even longer. Yay! Chase calls her on it, and she says she has an ulterior motive but can’t tell him what it is. Chase shrugs and puts another unicorn sticker in his Hannah Montana notebook.

House thinks the hiccups are cool, but is suspicious of Cameron’s motive, so he sends her back to the ER to see if she’ll leave. He’s not the boss of her, so she didn’t have to go do those tests like he asked. House cuts to the Chase: “Hey, you don’t still have the hots for me, do you?” She tries to say she’s just trying to help out after Kumar’s death, but House doesn’t buy that either, because she would have offered a week ago if that were the case. Back in the conference room, Powerpuff Cameron takes charge and Louie proposes MS, because the POW’s last name is Swenson, and people of Scandinavian descent have a higher rate of MS. It’s weak, but Cameron heads off to test for it. Foreman secretly goes to help, since it might be a bit tricky sticking a needle in the spine of someone who has hiccups, and because he’s the only Houseguest close enough to her to ask what’s going on. She won’t tell him either, but all signs point to trouble with Chase. Speaking of the lapdog, he’s sneaking around asking Cuddy if Cameron wants her old job back. Chase cuts to himself and asks if Cameron’s in love with House.

CUDDY: That… is a ridiculous question.

CHASE: Are you in love with House?

CUDDY: That…… is an even more ridiculous question.

CHASE: 2 questions, 0 answers.

2 insecure doctors, 2 raging cases of jealousy, 1 screwy love rectangle.

House is in the lounge looking for some food to steal when a woman comes in asking for him. It’s the POW’s wife-the one he said he didn’t have when he checked in to the hospital. House takes a bite of whatever he got from the fridge and throws it out. “Who eats kale? It’s so bland it doesn’t even taste like kale.” The POWife says the doctor next door said he’d be in there, and House gets a Subplot Lightbulb. He tracks down Cameron, who’s still trying to get a needle in the POW’s back, and accuses her of spying on him for Wilson. Cameron denies it, because Wilson is a better liar than her. Marginally. Meanwhile, the POW’s neck is getting all lumpy and crunchy.

Snap crackle pop.

This turns out to be caused by air leaking out of his lungs. Don’t ask me how that works, but it’s not MS, so who cares? Sarcoidosis is mentioned and there is much bingoing. 13 suggests systemic sclerosis (which doesn’t sound much different from multiple sclerosis, but whatever) and House sends the 2.0 Houseguests instead of Cameron to do the test. “Time to bring in the first string.” Waitaminnit, I thought they were the second string? Cameron huffs back down to the ER, where Cuddy straight up tells Cameron to stay out of her House. Only it comes out in passive-aggressive Cuddyspeak, something like “You shouldn’t be involved with House. Neither should I… You and Chase are good together.” Cameron neither confirms or denies this diagnosis, which would be really weird if it wasn’t necessary to keep us guessing.

In other Awkward Relationship News, the POWife is suggesting to her husband that he has mommy issues; i.e. he’s neglecting his family to Love His Mother. He proves this by going off on a wheezy rant about clean water and clean air and how he’s doing it for everyone on the Big Blue Marble, not just his family, because everyone else matters just as much. Talk about an inconvenient truth.

House barges into Wilson’s place and Wilson tells him to stay out of the kitchen. Which he knows will send House straight there. Wilson wants to hear House’s nutty explanation for the egg-white omelet Wilson had for breakfast. “Your single omelet theory conveniently overlooks the Grassy Knoll you had for lunch today.” Lulz. So that’s whose lunch House stole. Shoulda known. House blames Wilson’s diet on Kumar. Isn’t it funny how people always blame everything on the coworker who just left? Wilson attempts to disprove the Single Omelet Theory by showing off his fridge full of bacon and ice cream.

Two great tastes that taste great together!

House gets paged by the Houseguests, who were giving the POW some test when he started screaming his head off. It seems his leg hurts a bit. Louie and 13 X-ray the leg, and they must have shot Captain Planet up with some Big Pharmaceuticals, because he’s pretty quiet now. Good thing, because what’s an X-ray without a Houseguest Heart-to-Heart? (Bingo square, anyone?) 13 says it bothered her last week when Foreman clammed up after Kumar’s death. Louie is pragmatic as usual. “You wanna date men, good chance talking won’t be-” He quits talking, because SportsCenter just came on the X-ray shows a broken femur. All signs point to bone cancer. “It’s not cancer,” says Foreman.

Bingo!

But cancer explains the symptoms, and all that protesting around toxic waste dumps and nuclear plants means there’s a good chance he has some kind of cancer, so House decides to go with chemo just to be on the safe side. Although calling chemo “safe” is a bit like calling House “sweet”.

Chase is fixing the broken femur (brain tumors, broken legs, he does it all!) when Foreman busts in to tell him to get a bone biopsy, you know, just to be sure. He also lets slip that Cameron is off the case. Uh-oh. So where is Cameron hiding, then? She’s hanging out in the ER, being given the third degree by House, who thinks she’s hiding from relationship problems with Chase. Got it in… um… two or three! Truth is, Cameron found an engagement ring hidden in Chase’s drawer (you know, the one drawer she gave him), and thinks he’s going to propose on the vacation, and (natch) blames it on Kumar. “We’re all a little freaked out… I don’t want him to propose just because he’s scared.” House has got nothing for this, and walks off without a word.

Whew, OK, time for a little comic relief, clinic style. A woman has some sort of infection, and her husband is doing all the talking for her. “Tell him about your chest, honey. Her breasts are really tender.” And so on. House asks if they have a hot tub (no), if she goes to the gym (no), or goes to a hotel spa on business trips (no), and Cuddy interrupts to find out if Cameron’s stolen her prize away. “She doesn’t want back on my team, and she doesn’t want to jump me.” This is all Cuddy wants to know, so she’s good. House is out of leading questions to ask the wife, so he spills the truth: she has a skin infection that she caught from a hot tub she was in. Without her husband. And who can blame her, really?

Hot water and hot air don’t mix.

Foreman tells the POW he does not have cancer, just like he said. What he does have is a whole lot of bleeding in the legs. House doesn’t care, because it HAS to be cancer, and he’s ready to nuke the guy anyway, until Louie comes up with an even worse crazier idea: give him something to make the cancer worse until it’s bad enough for them to find it. House says go, and as they disappear into the elevator, he makes his why-didnt-i-think-of-that face.

Even the cane-in-the-door trick can’t help you now.

Now thoroughly discombobulated, House goes to see Dr. Feelgood for a cheering-up. He couldn’t save Kutner, it took him forever to figure out Cameron, and now he’s been out-Housed by Louie, of all people. Wilson talks him down off the ledge while munching a carrot. “Your mojo’s right where you left it, just keep playing with it.”

Make up your own baby carrot joke. Bone-us points if it mentions Bugs Bunny.

Meanwhilz, the POW is crashing. Told ya that was a bad idea. Speaking of bad ideas, Cameron is hiding from Chase in the cafeteria, until he finds her and dumps her. Wait, that’s a good idea. Let’s try again. House is desperate and The Houseguests Are Still Stumped. “Give me something. Give me a bad idea. Maybe I can turn it into a good one.” They have no ideas, so House says it’s time to redo all the tests. He goes to the stairs to see if Wilson has a lightbulb. Wilson’s trying to get something out of the snack machine. House is still trying to figure out Wilson’s strange new food habits and getting pissy because Wilson’s not eating anything House likes. Subplot lightbulb! Wilson is messing with his diet for the sole purpose of giving House a puzzle to solve, so he can get back to normal. House calls Wilson a “manipulative bitch” a time or two, and then… Main Plot Lightbulb!

House goes to ask the POW if they have a garden at home. Nope. Window box? Nope. Potted plants? Nope. Uh-oh. Last chance. Did he ever buy his wife flowers? Once, after missing an anniversary dinner. Bingo! (For House. I got mine 20 minutes ago.) He has some disease that he got from being stuck by a rose thorn. Remember how he hates commercially-grown flowers? Reverse irony is even cooler than forwards irony! Which reminds me of a Simpsons quote:

TEEN 1: Oh, here comes that cannonball guy. He’s cool.

TEEN 2: Are you being sarcastic, dude?

TEEN 1: I don’t even know anymore.

OK, that takes care of Captain Planet, so House is off to go fix Camerase. She goes to find him in the locker room, says she found the ring, and asks him to ask her to marry him. Chase lets her twist for about half a Seacrest, then gets down on his knee. Closing montage time! Wilson and House eat junk food together, the newly engaged couple goes to tell Cuddy the good news (and she looks super relieved), and House plays some Randy Newman tune on piano and harmonica. He’s interrupted by… the ghost of Amber, who snuggles up and says he’s not losing it after all.

Did someone say manipulative bitch?

So they’re getting pretty good at the closing scenes, huh? The last three or so have been gut-punchers. Did they hire someone away from Lost?

Sorry to make you guys wait a couple extra days this week!