Hi! I’m back prematurely, but not to worry, the recapping duty (heh-heh, I said, “duty.”) will be back upon Josh’s shoulders soon. In the meantime, please turn a blind eye to CRo’s drunken snark that follows. Unless, of course, you like that sort of thing. I mean, if you do, you have Anna from the Swell to thank since she makes a rockin’ Manhattan. But I babble (I’m prone to that). Full recap after the jump.

Love,
CRo

The show opens with Meredith and Derek (see how I did that?) in the bath together. The voiceover is talking about how the human eye has a blind spot. I’m guessing the first application to this is that Meredith keeps insisting that they take it slow. Hello? Already in the bath? Unless you’re taking a bubble bath with your swimsuit on, you’re already not taking it slow. I don’t know who they’re trying to fool with this one.

The next day, I’m assuming, Meredith visits her mother. She’s having no luck conversing with her when the Chief swoops in with some sort of pastry. Good things come in those pink boxes, perhaps if this were really filmed in Seattle, it’d be Cupcake Royale. Mmm, cupcakes. Meredith leaves the Chief there to hang with her mom and she heads off to work and we get our first Seattle establishing shot. Hi, Puget Sound!

In the locker room, Meredith doesn’t see everyone else is concerned about something and talks about herself – shocker – until she is told that George’s dad was admitted to the hospital. Word is he passed out and fractured his clavicle. I should mention that somewhere in that monologue she claims she’s going to be “bright and shiny Meredith” soon. I’m sure we all know better than to believe her. So anyway, Team Intern is looking over George’s dad’s charts when Bailey walks in demanding them – the charts – back. She assigns George to “scut” since apparently one does not treat family in this show, but let’s see how that pans out. Christina goes to scrub in with Burke, to Bailey’s dismay, and Izzie is to shadow Alex who is shadowing Mark. Wow! It’s a conga line!

Over in Derek’s part of the hospital, he greets his ex-wife cheerfully. They’re going to be civil he announces and, boy, I guess Meredith has infected him with her false sense of bright and shiny. And now that I think about it, maybe he’s just on a I-finally-had-sex-after-a-long-drought high. Not that I would know anything about that, because I totally wouldn’t. Anyway, there’s mention of their wedding rings that Addison is still wearing.

The O’Malley’s descend upon the hospital and can I say that I resent the fact that George’s brothers are portrayed as not knowing anything but cars. People who are mechanics can be smart, you know. How else do they manage to outsmart and cheat all of the rest of us when we need our cars fixed? They’ve got to be geniuses, so portray them as such, show! Anyway, seems that George’s dad needs an endoscopy. They make light of this procedure but I’ve been with a friend that had to get one of those and it’s not just pie. Anyway, Callie is talking up George and the family all talks cute, except, of course, George.

Back in shadow-land, Izzie and Alex are sent on the very important dry-cleaning and lunch run. I’m impressed that Alex hasn’t complained to anyone yet about his “shadowing” duties. If it were anyone else in this show, I’m sure we’d hear about this non-stop. As a result, Alex is now my favorite character. Way not to whine, doll face. Anyway, I love the “is it take a hot-blonde to work day” line that Mark uses. Hilarious. Even the coughing “sexual harassment” part.

Back in the hall, George is harassing Bailey. She relents and he gets to pick an intern other than himself to assist with the endoscopy. He chooses Christina and walks in on the surgery she and Burke are doing. He gets suspicious when Christina is pretty much doing it by herself.

And…Case A of the week ambulances up (like how I verbize nouns? No? Too bad.) Anyway seems that a kid has been run over by its mom’s SUV…but the twist is the nanny was doing the driving. Oooh, she’s getting canned, I can feel it. I mean one of the main rules of nannying has got to be “Do not run over the children.” Probably right after, “Don’t put the kids in the oven.” Seriously, top 5 at the very least.

After the break we come back in on Case A. Dad has shown up and we get the parents arguing about how the mom is a bad mom. Bailey tries to shut them up, but it doesn’t really work. Nanny gets run off and the kid goes to surgery.

Over in the other surgery room, George is grilling Christina and Burke. Burke lets Christina go assist with George’s dad.

Shadows: Addison scolds Mark for making Alex his slave, but he does not repent. Addison then tries to tattle on Mark to the Chief and Chief ignores her.

Case B. They say his name is Frank, but I assume it’s Jimmy because it’s just like that guy from Seinfeld who speaks in the third person. Jimmy (Frank ) has had complications with his pec enhancement surgery. He got a boob job! Awesome.

Back with George and he’s still grilling Christina. What’s this? He’s showing signs of observancy? Who knew interns could do that? In response, she blows him off because what else can she do?

Mia (aka Case A) is getting x-rays and they’re running us over with the SUV and by SUV I mean the fact that the child loves the nanny and that the nanny spends more time with the kid than the mom and dad.

In the O’Malley room, Callie is making George’s brothers all het-up by knowing about cars. George is pissed and tells her to back off. Guilt, it works so well. I know. My mother is a guilt genius. And then George is looking on while Chief and Christina perform the endoscopy. More guilt ensues, this time it’s George on himself.

Bailey and Meredith are working on Mia. Meredith is oh so shockingly trying to make this kid’s life about her own and manages to alienate Dr. Bailey about working mothers and how they don’t give kids enough love and attention because their careers are so important. Who knew this show was so 1950s? Bailey tells her, and rightly so, to shut her pie hole.

After commercials we’re on the board and George continues his quest to find out what’s up with Burke and instead of being subtle, even though he tries, basically grills Burke. And guess what? Burke blows him off.

Addison enlists Derek in her quest to help Chief. That’s going to go well, for sure.
In Jimmy’s room, Jimmy is admiring his breasts. Jimmy gets Izzie to compare Jimmy’s breasts to Alex’s. Jimmy has issues, but we knew that already because he refers to himself in the third person. How people like that even get other people to be their significant others is amazing to CRo. CRo thinks Jimmy must be good in bed. Or something to that effect.

Over in Case A world, Meredith pseudo-scolds Mia’s mom for not being a good mom. Wait, no, she actually scolds. She apparently can’t divorce her own experience from Case A’s. What a great bedside manner! The point of this scene though is for us to find out the nanny is fired and that they want to pretend to be okay about working mothers, but not really.

In Team Intern stairway, George grills (again) Christina. Izzie and Alex start talking in the third person. CRo approves.

Derek and Addison approach the Chief about his “depression.” After one sentence it, of course, becomes about them instead of the Chief. While they’re talking over each other, we find out that the Chief visits Meredith’s mom once a week but he misses his wife and that he doesn’t want his marriage to be over. Christina comes in with bad news but about who? Uh-oh. Down the hall, Chief tells George something about his dad’s test results and George takes Christina in to his dad’s room to pass on the news. George really can’t do it, so Christina steps up. George’s dad has cancer of the esophagus (damn, I can’t believe I spelled that right on the first try!) and they need to operate. Eek. No good. And we break.

After commercials we get to see more Seattle! Yay! Hi, Elliot Bay and Space Needle.

Meredith comes upon Izzie and George in the stairway. George is melting down about all the stress and realizes he’s been grilling Christina and Burke in order to not face his own many issues. And here comes the phrase I hate most in this episode: “us with the boobs…we make a lot of bad decisions.” What?! What?! Why does this show hate women so much? Why? Why? Okay, I’ll calm down.

Out in plastics-land, Jimmy counsels Alex to make a grand gesture towards Izzie. Okay, I agree with the grand gesture idea and all, but taking advice from a dude in the hospital because his boob job went bad? Probably not a good idea.

Derek and Meredith talk about Mia. They agree today is not so bright and shiny since Mia needs another surgery. Getting run over is apparently as bad as one would imagine.

Christina is in George’s dad’s room. They’re checking out his heart to make sure he can do the cancer surgery. George’s dad informs Christina that George thinks she’s the best in the hospital and then there’s something wrong. She looks at the results and doesn’t say much but it’s apparent there’s something not so good. Outside we learn that his aortic valve is leaking. George insists that Burke will do the surgery because Burke is the best. Christina starts to get nervous. I know this means she’s going to fuck up George’s dad’s surgery and the drama is going into overdrive. I know it! Bailey overhears and let’s hope she saves that ER type drama. I mean, seriously.

In Chief’s office, Meredith comes in. Chief wants to break up with Meredith’s mother, but that’s hard since she’s not all there. He basically puts it on Meredith because he wants to make a go at it with his wife, Adele.

In Jimmy’s room, Alex makes the grand gesture by allowing Izzie to take Jimmy’s boob tube out.

In surgery, everyone is watching Derek operate on Mia. Addison is contemplating her rings. Callie decides she’s not ready to give up on George and leaves. Bailey is continuing to feel guilty about not being home enough for her kid because you know a woman’s life is not real unless it’s about the freaking baby. Argh.

George confronts Christina. He tells her she’s a robot and insults her sort of and then asks if she will be honest about Burke. Hasn’t he ever heard that honey and vinegar quote? Apparently not.

In the stairway, Izzie is happy about taking out the boob tube and Alex decides that he doesn’t want to be my favorite anymore and tries to kiss her. How long has it been since she killed someone? The someone that she was going to marry? A little too soon, dude! Reminds me of a friend of mine who broke up with her boyfriend and three days later was confused that he wasn’t over it yet. Why aren’t people ready when I am? It’s so weird!

Anyway, over in Mia’s room, we’re still being bludgeoned by the fact that the kid loves the nanny more than mom and dad, those terrible people who make money so this kid can have every advantage that she could possibly have. Evil, evil parents.

In George’s dad’s room, George condescends to his brothers until Callie shows up and makes a cancer-car metaphor for their lowly minds to understand. It’s sad in a lot of ways, too many to mention even.

In Mia’s room, the nanny’s back. And then we’re with Meredith and her mom. Meredith has to tell her mom that the Chief is breaking up with her. Mom is lucid enough to realize that he’s gone back to his wife but that’s about it.

Christina tells George’s dad that George is the best in the hospital, which is nice of her. She is the best in the hospital. Smart, better bedside manner, and can kick ass with a motorcycle helmet. I like her. Alex, you’ve been demoted.

End time montage! At the bar, Izzie forgives Alex for being insensitive. Bailey sings to her son via cellphone. Addison throws her rings into the bay (Wait, isn’t that polluting?). Christina tells Burke that George knows. George is in bed not sleeping. And then we close on Meredith and Derek back in her awesome tub. They bond over not being bright and shiny. And then we’re out. And next time is really the time that Josh takes back over. I’m sure you’re all happy. I’ve gotta get back to my beverage, this show’s driving me to drink…or back to drink…or something.

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