The Dope Box TV Blog

A quickened heartbeat can symbolize a number of things. It can be the result of an illness or disease, but most often we associate a racing heart with emotion: fear, panic, love.

Bailey’s just returned from a 3 day vacation to find out she’s getting promoted. She looks like she’s on the verge of collapsing when she gets her first case. A deathly ill child, precisely what she’d like to avoid. Although she has quiet moments of panic, she doesn’t let the child see it. She calmly translates Dixon’s awkward barrage of medical jargon. And later, talks her through getting stabbed in the chest with a needle so huge it should have had Acme written on the side and been administered by a wascally wabbit.

In surgery, it’s clear the kid’s heart is diseased or, as Dixon tactfully puts it, “finished.”  Bailey is so upset she leaves mid-surgery to have some cuddle time with her son. Inspired by a backpack, she figures out a way for the girl to get her meds without being imprisoned in a hospital bed. All the happiness and celebration (and one rogue hug from the mom) makes Dixon blow a gasket. The solution? Applying deep pressure to decrease her metabolic rate and slow her speedy pulse. We laymen know this as a bear hug.

Bailey’s composed strength with ailing kids and her determination to find a solution, however unorthodox, proves she’d be a stellar pediatric surgeon. Plus, she’s a master bedazzler.

Romance is blooming all over Seattle Grace. With Denny out of the picture, Izzie and Alex are enjoying sexy-time sans jealous dead guy interruptions. She’s also having interns do a zillion tests on her, apparently heeding Denny’s warnings about her health. The blood tests say she’s just anemic. As far as I know, a low concentration of hemoglobin doesn’t cause ghostly hallucinations. I’m guessing the interns (in all their daftness) accidentally switched the test results. I’ll be delighted when that plotline dies, even if it takes Izzie with it.

Blink-and-you-miss-him George spottings: briefly mocking Izzie’s unnecessary MRI; tiny lunchroom caveat about avoiding heinous sex position number 15.

Sloane’s fractured penis caused the relationship he has with Lexie to strengthen. Forced to forgo sex, they two have been growing on an emotional level. She wants to end the secrecy and be a couple in public. Callie also gets in on the debate, calling him an idiot and having yet another personally revealing outburst during surgery. “I’m celibate!”

Derek is trying to find the perfect way to propose to Meredith. Yang tells him not to go overboard, while the Chief insists that proposals should include skywriting and rowboating. Derek would just like to be able to ask without fearing she’ll jump off a dock into icy water and forget to be buoyant.

Hearing Meredith talk about how cute their babies are going to be makes Derek get that gooey-eyed look. He then avoids her like the plague because he’s nervous about the proposal. She thinks he’s spooked by the notion that their spawn will be genetically inferior, citing Alzheimer’s, suicidal tendencies, and split ends (noticeably absent from her list: a predilection for whining, trouble noticing that which doesn’t directly involve her). He consoles her, adorably confirming that he does indeed want her “crappy babies.”

In the end, he opts to set the stage with a roomful of roses, candles, and a slightly disturbing stuffed polar bear. When Meredith comes home later, the room is swept clean with only a solitary rose petal left behind. Derek left to help Addison’s brother, that guy from Melrose Place. Because, let’s face it, parasitic brain infestations always take precedent over sweeping romantic gestures.

For me, the exchange between Yang and Hunt made Derek’s efforts look like clichéd schmaltziness. Dreamy piano music plays and the pair are shown in slow motion. They walk close beside each other without speaking, both of them shy but keenly aware of the other’s presence. He glances over at her neck and softly grazes the back of her hand with his fingers before departing. Later, they smile at each other from across the hall, a similar scene beginning again, until Hunt spots a woman he evidently has some kind of history with and dives into a nearby room. Clearly in the midst of a panic attack, he tells Yang to leave him, but she administers the bear hug treatment gleaned from Dixon. He relents, devastated and traumatized by his mysterious past. In the on-call room, Hunt sleeps peacefully, wrapped around Cristina. You may now commence with swooning.

New rainbow couple alert: Arizona follows lonely Callie in to Joe’s bathroom. She comforts her by saying people only say the nicest things whilst gossiping about her. “The talk is good.” She makes up for her inarticulate speech with a solid lesbian snog.

“You’re a tiny person.” -Dixon