Season One, Episode 11, "Detox" - Added Monkey With A Dildo

While trying to figure out why a young patient (Nicholas D'Agosto) will not stop bleeding after a car wreck, House accepts Cuddy's challenge and goes off Vicodin for a week in exchange for no clinic duty for a month. As House's withdrawal symptoms become severe, his methodology for his patient are more harsh and risky, and Foreman and Cameron are afraid he may not be thinking clearly enough in order to save the patient's life. 

& about time too! is this the 1st time addiction gets mentioned? why now? because the Vicodin is late? how is it he doesn't keep a stash in his office for emergencies? or would that be too much of an admission of an addict personality trait? YEAH? LIKE HE ISN'T ADDICTED TO TV AND MEDICINE? well, ok--the latter is harmless and (as discussed previously) more of a substitute for passion, while the latter is..
. 
"pills don't make me high. they make me neutral." 

 this is a hard argument to fight. the rest of the ep is devoted to him going cold turkey and trying to save another life/solve another puzzle. You are forced to wonder that, IF he had his meds, he would have gotten to the solution earlier. but that is unlikely: the patient history missed the pet, and as foreman said at the outset: "can't be environmental factors. the father had a team come in and test. replaced everything with hypoallergenic bedding too." 

(actually having a mold case here at the law office wherein the plaintiff is accusing the first "remediators" of doing such a poor job that they missed a major part of the infestation and made them sick all over again. so i can see a major lawsuit vs. the ones who did the job on the show.) 

as usual, it is the last bit of casually tossed-off info that breaks the case. but that doesn't negate his argument. when cuddy ("that's double what you were taking when i hired you") and then wilson ("remember? i was there! i know!") allude to watershed moments--she to the actual risk she decided was worth it; he to some precipitous event, either the thrombosis(?) or something equally catastrophic that made him the bitter cynic he is--neither, at either end of this "intervention" (of sorts) really address this issue: neutrality. 

the pills ARE NOT destroying his life. they may be part and parcel of damaging his view of the human race, but that's something we all struggle with--"let he who is without sin," etc. there were mentions of other treatments, palliative care is the term i believe, and he dismissed these outright. and why? 

probably because they would have meant an interruption to the one thing that drives his existence. and PURPOSE is also a drug. give a man a dose and he can move mountains, topple regimes. if palliative care DID NOT interfere with his work, he'd probably opt for it. 

you know, it just struck me the other day, the reason why "House" is so great for you, may have to do with all the time you've spent under physician's care. i listen to the terminology and realize that i am going to have to spend more time at that polite dissent site. i lack basic vocabulary. but i digress... i remember that one pharmoneuro(cologist?) you had who was reading your mood swings like flowcharts. Must've felt like housarbeit. 

AND NOW FOR THE MAJOR REVELATION! 

surrender. you ever heard "sweet surrender" by tim buckley? one of his best, and & that's saying something. 

my quibbles with character flaws must cease; they profiteth me not and naught. in a real world, the way house works miracles would not be seen so much as reason to repel lawsuits as a drawing card for alumni donors. he'd have new yorker profiles and local headlines as "the doctor who saves lives...or people he can barely stand" and even have loveable curmudgeonly portraits painted by his patients on Live at Five. yup. 

[Foreman:] the formula! streetsmart kid who bootstrapped himself up & out and is now probably one step from clarence thomas in his view of that past. 
[Cameron:] Ms. straight-A, goody-two-shoes who was all-varsity field hockey captain while volunteering for meal-on-wheel for AIDS victims, has her mayfly romance/tragedy to give her preternatural wisdom beyond her tender years. 
[Chase:] Aussie dreamboat transfers his desire to aid the afflicted from god to darwin but still can't get over his (probable) jesuit training to accept an authority figure as the Last Word. that's yr. ducklings. 

as for Wilson and Cuddy? jury's still out. PS. comic relief with the masseuse--i may have actually laughed.

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As long as we're talking Darwin, have a stuffed monkey with a dildo

& about time too! is this the 1st time addiction gets mentioned? why now? because the Vicodin is late? how is it he doesn't keep a stash in his office for emergencies? 

In later episodes he does, can't remember which. A season or two later. It was played more as a joke than anything else. I'm not sure if this is the first time "addiction" is mentioned. House's habit is front and center but I can't remember if there's been any sort of conversation about it, other than his liking to pop pills in front of people whenever he can.

You also see, in this episode, that even though House is incredibly manipulative, Wilson is just as manipulative in his own way. After all, Cuddy presented the detox idea as hers, but it was Wilson's. Wilson believes House is an addict, so he has House put through this to "prove" Wilson's point. But it doesn't really "prove" anything except, as we talked about, that it makes it possible for House to function normally. 

i listen to the terminology and realize that i am going to have to spend more time at that polite dissent site. i lack basic vocabulary

Most viewers who aren't obsessed as I am--the majority, actually--have no idea what the doctors are talking about. That's one of the reasons for the Magic School Bus Cam. Have they had anyone go into anaphylactic shock yet? That's one of my favorites. The throat closing together like fast elevator doors. 

that's also the one caused by peanuts? maybe. i mean, I've seen a couple that they may have said it, but it goes by so fast when they get into those "trauma ward chase scenes", to coin a phrase. (Or not. for all i know that may be another of your clan's tropes.) 

i remember that one pharmoneuro(cologist?) you had who was reading your mood swings like flowcharts.  

That was when my psycho-pharmacologist had me in that study of bipolar women and their reproductive cycles. So truly a flow chart, hah. Since my lady parts came out of the factory broken, apparently my moods were never affected by my cycle. Life events, yes, menstruation, no.

Aussie dreamboat transfers his desire to aid the afflicted from god to darwin but still can't get over his (probable) jesuit training to accept an authority figure as the Last Word. 

Actually, Chase is a weaselly rich kid whose father made a phone call to get him on the team. Yes, his seminary training gets in the way, but Chase looks out for Chase, first and foremost. And his lips are super-glued to House's butt.

am i missing something or is that not a contradiction? "me first" but "House first"? 

Season 1, Episode 8 "Poison" It's Getting Personal...

House and his team investigate the mysterious poisoning of high-school student Matt Davis (guest star John Patrick Amedori), until another teen is brought in with all of the same symptoms but almost nothing else in common with Matt.

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Final diagnosis: Phosmet poisoning


i've had a minor revelation with regard to the soap opera watching. i think it was wilson who explained "he needs to think", to one of the duckling's astonishment, "is he going to watch tv?" Holmes would play the violin: house becomes absorbed in petty dramas...because it frees his mind to consider the larger ones. i've had this ongoing disc. w/ Ed [the guy i do media funhouse with] with regard to movies seen on tv are not movies. purist that he is, there is a point there; the wide-screen can never be matched by the small one.

but the fact that house watches on a hand-held portable when the maternity lounge is out or he's not in his office. i am of the opinion that any way you take in the information is ok, provided you know what you are missing. house, this is all about entertaining the imagination, for me. on the other hand, house would seem to be using General Hospital as a screen, something to filter away the soap opera of his desmense and concentrate on the problem without any other considerations, including the patient's life.

in his view, then, the survival of the patient is incidental to the solution to the problem. [or maybe i heard wilson say it, don't remember] BUT, again, this is a new way of looking at short attention span vs attention deficit disorder: the former could be nothing more than a refusal to give consideration to things not of one's interest; the latter is more like the choice in not optional--you can't remain focused no matter how interested you are...unless the object of your attention is itself a constantly changing one, like a videogame, but without any positive resolution.

OK. TO THE EP.

house watches the portable in from of the mother of the dying boy. this is really what i was getting at above. to show his interest in saving the kid's life, sure, but also to demonstrate the contempt he has for the mother's desire to control everything--all while filtering out the human noise of a life/death decision. omar epps (who's show name i can't remember right now--the black guy) doesn't seem to be living in the same universe as us. DOESN'T ANYBODY IN THIS HOSPITAL HAVE A MEMORY?

it gets irritating to find him always insulting house; i mean, OK? at first he seemed almost flattered to have been 'picked for the team', right? if he's so dissatisfied, why doesn't he transfer out. then? at the end, he gets called one of the "two egomaniacs who saved your life" by moms, and then they cut to the shoes. OK. you've said it already. the shoes are significant. right. i don't buy enough shoes to understand this, i guess, but i accept it. what bothers me is the way this becomes more ridiculous when they are asked to do these off-site searches for clues. the way the ducklings stick their necks out just on his say-so. they are still paying off their first-year loans! NOBODY WOULD SCREW WITH PAYING BACK THAT WEIGHT!

Dr. Foreman in a leisure moment

the comic relief with the old lady w/the hots for house--this is a really funny bit, esp. when wilson reads the love poem. so MAYBE that's their foreplay? making outrageous gesture in public? Naaaah! can't be, can it? i can't see house ever breaking his cool demeanor to camp.

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Tell Ed he can blow me.  Movies seen on tv are still movies, but they are MOVIES SEEN ON TV.  Of course you lose something in translation.  I'm old enough to remember revival theaters.  Ask Ed this: if movies seen on tv are not movies, then what are movies made for tv?  Are they still movies?

House doesn't have a short attention span when he's involved in a case or something else that obsesses him.  That's one of his problems; all or nothing at all, in which case soap operas, etc. provide relief from the constant thinking.  (Ala Sherlock Holmes)

since this show is an alternate universe, breaking into people's homes is one of the things they do on a regular basis. House rarely does it himself. It's entertaining and it saves a lot of talky exposition. Yes, it is a definite suspension of belief. And the whole "Foreman is House Lite" is idiotic. I've never understood why the show keeps on insisting they're alike when they are nothing alike.

*Foreman - black guy 
Chase - Australian pretty boy 
Cameron - young female assistant 
Cuddy - sexy boss 

Dr. Cuddy in a leisure moment

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I DIDN'T SAY HOUSE HAD SAS OR ADD. i said this was a distinction BETWEEN SAS and ADD. or perhaps it isn't. i have no idea what the reference guide says about the two. it just appears to me to be interesting that there are two term so close together, that if they are NOT describing the same syndrome, they should be. as far as his use of the tools of technology, so far i have seen house watching GH in various settings, and there was one show in which he was playing a hand-held video game. the fact that he keeps these devices around (or more) is sufficient for my theory as stated above.

 ME? i used, and still use, stuff like that so that i will not be considering the wreckage of my past and the gloom of my future. so far, all i can say with certainty is that house has more than a bad leg to make him a misanthrope. what else, i cannot speculate on at this point. (it surely isn't homosexual panic.) the only reason not to be polite or pay court or play games is THAT IT WASTES TIME.

now, remember what i said about you? how your being late was not a chronic disability to tell time as much as a chronic disrespect for other's time. house's TV time is more important than any consult? this is doubtful. but he can use it to demonstrate contempt for the other dr.'s time. that's also part of the anti-intellectual charm of his TV watching. its like when i talk about going to McDonald’s in every country i visit. you wouldn't believe how hostile some people get when i talk about them. nonetheless, the key word is FILTER, and it's salient point is distraction. some people put on a tie, sit at the desk and rearrange papers. some go running. some drink. these are all ways to get to think by removing the blocks to thinking--just different strokes. i would more likely diagnose house as a monomaniac--someone with the need to focus on one thing to the exclusion of all else.

 Bemis is judging you. Harshly

By the way, in terms of memory, the folks at "House" brag that they don't have a "bible," which is what it sounds like for every show.  Characters, timeline, storylines, etc.  Unfortunately, this makes for whopping continuity errors (esp. the past two seasons) the longer the show goes on.  We crazed fans scream a lot when the show chooses to ignore an important back-story, which has been happening a lot.

Season One, Episodes 3 & 4: Occam's Razor and Maternity

Description:(Occam's Razor)

After calling in sick at work, 22-year-old college student Brandon (Kevin Zegers) spends the morning having wild sex with his fiancee--and then lapses into unconsciousness. It's obvious to Dr. House (Hugh Laurie) that Brandon wasn't lying about being sick, but his symptoms are mysterious and contradictory--and worse, they keep multiplying. As he tries to figure out this puzzle, House saves time by treating all of his other patients in a record five minutes.

this is a gimme. Occam's Razor  first became popularized via the jodie foster film "contact" from the book by carl sagan. since then, it has become the 'go-to' concept used by everyone as shorthand for critical thinking, and because it sounds sooo cool...which is part and parcel of the essence of this particular episode: teenage sex! yes, starts off with a bang! and why? so the cute F asst. can tease the cute M asst. with saucy asides as she thrust out her prodigious headlamps at him in the lounge. and, as well, the whole 'defiance-in-the-face-of-authority' thang gets the patient a full body scan and medical just because house identifies with her attitude. see? it pays to be cool!

ok. i'll bite. who IS Wilson? seems to be an administrator who's always around but doesn't work for the uber-she. 
 

Description:  Maternity

After checking on two neonatal infants who have suffered mysterious seizures, House (Hugh Laurie) concludes that the clinic has become the breeding ground for a deadly epidemic--which is rapidly spreading to the other newborns. In order to isolate the reason for this outbreak and to stop it in its tracks, House is faced with a difficult choice: One of the babies will have to die to save the others. As it turns out, the source of the epidemic has little to do with babies, but neither House nor the audience finds this out until the very last moment

Maternity. you know, when i think about the Paternity episode, i think it really ought to have been called, Parenting, because it didn't have anything to do with a paternity suit and the fact that the kid was adopted makes it more about a 'family matter' than anything having to do with who was the sire and who was the dam...and who is the parasite. which may have been the major point of this ep, as house gets to show his contempt for children as well. as for the treatment? no way. never in 1000yrs. this is the stuff that trial lawyers' dreams are made of. sorry, uh-uh. violates credibility

House agrees: everything is better with bacon!

so, why is he in the maternity lounge? to watch the TV? he doesn't seem to mind watching his portable, so why would he change his habits? as you know, habits aren't hard to break, they're fucking impossible to break--they can only be substituted for or curbed, but only with FULL SELF-KNOWLEDGE! and he doesn't ever make a comment that his M asst., the blonde guy, is a dead ringer for the one on GH?

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Wow,  you're getting obsessed!  I STILL cannot believe you are watching every episode of this show from the beginning.  Once you burn out, I'll give you a list of the particularly good episodes.  Bear in mind that in the first season they're still working out the kinks.

Remember, this is television, not reality, so there's a lot of shorthand.  Also, the titles usually mean several different levels (maybe not Occam's Razor, but it became standard later on and gave the analysis monkeys something to dissect).  The reality is that a real hospital would NEVER keep a doctor like House for more than three weeks. But this character is the springboard for 1,000 snarky main characters. Check out:

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/House

This site...well, you have to see for yourself.  I think you will really, really like it and not just because of the show. The beginning of the shows are called "teasers" for a reason.  Last season and this season have had overreaching teasers that strain credulity to the breaking point.  What's a gimme?

 catchall for 'been-there/done that' etc. simply that any episode with that title is going to be a cultural hitchhike upon the fender skirts of greater minds...

Wilson's character didn't really come together until Season Two.  He's the head of oncology but who seems to have plenty of time to hang around House and his crew.  Last season they did an episode called "Wilson" in which they explored his day, more or less.  The parts involving House's team was pretty funny, because you saw how completely insane it looks from the outside.  Wilson both works for the uber-she, but also conspires with her to control House.

so, why is he in the maternity lounge? to watch the tv? he doesn't
seem to mind watching his portable, so why would he change his habits?
as you know, habits aren't hard to break, they're fucking impossible
to break--they can only be substituted for or curbed, but only with
FULL SELF-KNOWLEDGE!

House will do ANYTHING to keep from being bored.  Everything is a substitute for his basic addiction: medicine.  Without medicine he is nothing.  Well, he's a drug addict, too.  Pills, video games, television...as for the latter, House watches it all over the hospital as long as he can be left alone.  Mostly in the wing where the coma patients are.  For the medical, etc., you should check a great site, "Polite Dissent," in which a doctor analyzes the medicine in each episode. There are several doctors on the staff, but still, the show plays fast and loose.  This show in some ways is as formulaic as "Law And Order"; patient shows up, the staff nearly kills him a few times before finding the disease--although sometimes they die. 

no way. never in 1000yrs. this is the stuff that trial lawyers' dreams are made of. sorry, uh-uh. violates credibility 

As I wrote earlier, in real life House would never sustain employment.  But this is a tv show called "House, MD," so...

right. answers the above. understood. this is "medical lite" like law&order is "legal lite". so the idea is to ignore the contrivances [after all, this is listed as a mystery] and concentrate on adapting the acerbic comments to any public discourse i might engage in, yes?