Hey, guess what, guys! There's virtually NO FOURTEEN in this week's episode! Can you believe it? I almost couldn't. Someone took pity on me. I'm not sure if I traded up, though, as this episode prominently features an academic term that's used so egregiously that my old political philosophy professor would stick a pencil in his eye if he saw this episode. Thankfully for him, I don't think he owns a television.
We join this week's unlucky bastard (and I use that term in its most endearing sense) at a fancy-smanchy restaurant. "Nick," a high-powered editor, is having dinner with one of his bestselling authors. Nick, however, appears to have too much alcohol. He calls the author "mathematically illiterate" and insults his publisher before he notices he's got a nosebleed. He falls out of his chair and the room gasps.
The team passes Nick's file to House when he walks in, as the case reminds them of Phineas Gage because the patient is experiencing frontal lobe disinhibition. House thinks it's the chardonnay talking, but Taub insists Nick was sober when he was admitted. The MRI revealed no tumors on his brain, but Thirteen thinks there could be one in his nasal cavity. House orders a nasopharyngoscopy to check it out.
Nick, meanwhile, is playing cards with his daughter on the hospital bed. He keeps telling her which cards he has, so she keeps winning. I feel like I've seen this plot device before, somewhere... Taub and Kumar come in to do the nose-scope and Nick insults Kumar's bedside manner. I'm glad someone finally did. Kumar ranks only slightly above Thirteen on my List of Doctors Who Will Never Touch Me EVER. Nick's wife reveals that his daughter has an "auditory processing disorder" (this will come up later) and asks if she can step out to make a call about the Breast Cancer Walk she's organizing. "Yeah, you do that. I'll pretend to be macho while a guy shoves three feet of plastic up my nose. [To Taub] It's too bad it's not your nose. Lots more room to maneuver." Mean, yes. But still funny. Nick starts bashing on his wife's profession of choice. It's getting to be awkward. "Make this go away," Nick pleads, "... god, that honker really is huge, isn't it?" Taub's trying really hard to stay professional, and I commend him for that. Because I would have shoved that plastic tube up Nick's nose with no mercy whatsoever. But that's why I'm not a doctor.
As they trot down the corridor, House is trying to get Wilson to go to a monster truck rally with him. Wilson declines, and admits that he doesn't like monster trucks. He only goes to the rallies because House likes them. "I can only watch so many hyped-up dune buggies crush so many motor homes without feeling the urge to go see La Bohème -- and I hate opera, too." Wilson, that's ridiculous! No one can hate La Bohème. House thinks Wilson's hiding something. "I'm saying it loud and proud: 'death to monster trucks.'" Kumar interrupts to report that there's no tumor, and that Nick's marriage is going to be on the rocks if he keeps saying everything that pops into his head. "You always led me to believe you were one of a kind," Wilson jabs at House. "Luckily, jerkiness is a temporary condition for this guy," Kumar says. "No it's not," House responds, "We may be able to fix his impulse to say his thoughts out loud, but he's always going to be the guy who thinks them." "But he's also going to be the guy who doesn't say them," Wilson jumps in, "If he's spent his whole life constructing this nice-guy persona, isn't that as much who he really is as anything else?" "You would argue that," House fires back, "You're all persona." Kumar then interrupts with a Harry Potter reference about sorting hats that I don't understand, because I've tried to stay as far away from that particular phenomenon as possible. It has something to do with putting kiddies in magical houses. House and Wilson look as confused as I feel. "There's damage in his brain. Go find it," House orders.
Foreman and Thirteen (gack - it's okay, though, it'll be quick) are doing a functional MRI on Nick in order to check the blood flow to different parts of the brain. "I don't mean to be abrasive," Nick apologizes to Thirteen, "especially since you're such a pleasure to imagine naked. Again, sorry... thank you for understanding. I'd do you, though -- really, my apologies, this stuff just comes--" "That's okay," Thirteen reassures. I think she's enjoying this just a little. Cuddy bursts in because House paged her. "Woah," Nick muses, "I would do her in a minute with fudge and a cherry on top... would someone please explain to this woman? There's only so many apologies I can--" Thirteen saves him, explaining Nick's problem to Cuddy. "I've already embarrassed myself with one doctor, whom I am, at this moment, imagining with you in a king-sized bed with a mirror on the ceiling -- I am so, so sorry. But if I couldn't have both of you together, you would definitely be my first choice," Nick admits, looking at Cuddy. "It's like trying not to think of an elephant. Not that you're an elephant. Your breasts, in fact, are all homo sapiens..." Cuddy wants to know where the hell House is, at which point the lights in the observation room come on, revealing House (DUN DUN DUN) kicking back in one of the chairs, looking pleased as Carrie Bradshaw in the aftermath of a Jimmy Choo sale. "Your tush is like the pistons in a Ferarri," Nick calls after Cuddy as she leaves. House follows her out. "You're welcome," he says. House was basically using the guy who can't tell a lie to let Cuddy know that she looks nice. "You don't get the slightest kick out of that?" he asks her as she heads into the elevator. "Don't be ridiculous, House," Cuddy warns as the doors close. Left alone, though, she lets herself have an amused little smirk. A little bit of objectification can be nice.
"I hope you know your pistons are second to none," Foreman reassures Thirteen in the observation room. Aww, ten whole minutes of no Fourteen -- I knew I was getting my hopes up too high. Thirteen brushes it off, but Foreman thinks she looks upset. Thirteen points out that Nick was being annoying (duh) and she was uncomfortable being cast in his mental porno. She distinguishes between being attractive sexually and having the "whole package" being attractive. They decide to ask Nick if he votes the same way as his wife in order to stimulate his brain for the test. "God no," he responds, "she believes I voted for Hilary Clinton in the primary and Obama in the general. You're thinking that I'm secretly Republican, right? Wrong. I secretly don't vote. Ever." Foreman and Thirteen find a problem area in the cingulate gyrus, but it's too close to the brain stem to operate on. Foreman thinks it's neurosarcoidosis, which can be treated by steroids. Foreman checks out Thirteen's ass as she leaves.
Taub and Kumar get lunch at the cafeteria, worrying about bedside manners and big noses. Taub drops title of this week's episode in the context of his big nose: "Maybe that's the social contract. You tell me I look great, I tell you you're a people person." Jean-Jacques Rousseau is rolling over in his grave. Really House, meanwhile, sits down for lunch with Wilson. House berates Wilson for being a nice, spineless amoebae. "Why do you think the world will end in chaos and destruction if you're not there to save it?" House asks, chomping down on a French fry. "Because when my put me in the rocket and sent me here, they said, 'James, you will grow to manhood under a yellow sun--'" Wilson starts, but before he can get any further on this giggle-inducing metaphor, House cuts him off to ask what the hell Wilson's doing instead of going to the monster truck rally with him. Turns out he's playing racquetball with Taub and didn't tell House because he didn't want to rub House's nose in the fact that he was doing something House can no longer do. Ouch -- that's pretty cruel for Wilson.
Foreman walks into Nick's room to find him short of breath. His kidneys are failing -- dialysis, stat!
The team tosses out new diagnoses as Taub examines his nose with the help of a spoon. Systemic sclerosis and chronic lymphocytic leukemia are both ruled out, leaving diabetes or a congenital metabolic disorder. House can't let go of the racquetball issue and, apparently, Jews can't be athletes. Whatever, House. He wants the daughter tested for peripheral nerve damage and Nick tested for diabetes via glucose tolerance test. He also assigns Taub to do the blood tests (every couple hours) as punishment for lying-- er, playing racquetball with Wilson.
Kumar sets Nick's little girl up for the peripheral nerve damage test (pads on her hands and feet that get hot or cold -- she's supposed to let Kumar know when they get uncomfortable) and tells her, "The better you do, the better we know your dad is." While Nick's wife angsts about what a dickwad her husband is, Kumar notes that Nick's little girl should be feeling something by now. She screams -- the pad burned her hand, but she wasn't saying anything because she wanted to help her daddy. Universe 1, Kumar's Bedside Manner, 0 (it should be like -47,569, but we'll start with a clean slate for this episode).
While getting his blood drawn, Nick gives Taub the "actions speak louder than words" speech, interrupting it to note that Taub must have cheated on his wife, and everyone knows about it. Say whaa? Presumably Taub's acting shifty here because he's being reminded that he's lying to House, because I've been getting nothing but "happy couple" out of Taub's interactions with his wife.
Enter... morgue. Okkaaay. House is sitting in the corner, tossing a ball into the air. A fresh corpse is keeping him company. Taub walks in, as House paged him. House wants an update on Nick's condition, and would Taub please do that while hitting the ball against the morgue wall with a racquet? Cool. Blah blah, sugar levels didn't rise -- Taub isn't doing too badly with that ball, actually. Until he hits it too high and it destroys a row of shelving. CRASH. Oops? "Fine! I'm not playing racquetball with Wilson, I was never playing racquetball with Wilson, I have never played racquetball with Wilson. I thought it would be helpful if a department head owed me a favor, but it's not worth this," Taub admits. House tells him he put on a good show, but he's holding a squash racquet in his hand. D'oh!
