Water Cooler Talking Points: Grey's Anatomy

1. Medical Metaphor of the Week - the chairman of the board of Seattle Grace shows up as a patient. Turns out his trip to the Amazon left him with one more souvenir than he wanted: a candiru fish lodged in his nether regions. Before that diagnosis is made, we learn that his assistant fears she may have what he has, as she doubles as his girlfriend. Also showing concern is the chairman's wife, who shows up later.

All of this winds up being a shadow play about George's cheating on Callie with Izzy, as by the end of the show the chairman loses both his assistant and his wife (who knew about the assistant's, uh, "other duties as assigned"). Faced with the fact that he can't keep working with Callie and Izzy, George plans a transfer to Mercy West.

2. At least it wasn't a slap bet... though she may like that - we're about halfway through the no sex bet between Addison and Sloan, which would mean something if Addison hadn't already decided she didn't want Sloan. Her thoughts turn to Karev, and after an OR session where he makes the difference in Ava delivering her baby early, Addison jumps him (OK, it may have been more of a bipartisan jumping, but I say she started it). Karev later learns from Ava that Addison sees him as being the solid guy she wants. He disagrees, and later blows off Addison by noting she's not his girlfriend. Addison then leaves the hospital, turning to give a sad look to the building. It's almost like she's going to leave and take a new job somewhere else... that would never happen, right?

3. Bailey can't stop working - Bailey is assigned to the candiru case (along with almost every other surgeon at SGH), but also scrubs in when a regular clinic patient is found not to have a cold, but spinal fluid leaking from his skull. This freaks her out and drives her to work harder, which the Chief warns her about given how things have turned out for him. She just keeps working.

4. Get her some floaties already - Meredith tries to repair the damage caused when she told Derek he was hovering by being overly-communicative. He is still hung up on the Chief's talk from last week where he learned he could be Chief or with Meredith, not both. He's also still trying to get past Meredith's almost drowning, saying that he feels like he's still breathing for her (as he did after pulling her out of the water).

5. Please just get married and end this plot line, please! - Burke wants Yang to pick a cake with him. She doesn't care. He sees this as further proof of her disinterest in their impending marriage and life together. The whole SGH crew gets to taste cakes, and during this Izzy confides in Burke that she slept with George. He'd rather have not known that. Izzy tells him the red velvet is the best, which Yang also says later on. Burke takes this as proof that Yang cares; I see it as proof that Izzy told Yang what to say.

Water Cooler Talking Points - Lost

Time for a new feature here, where I give you some talking points with which you can at least appear to know what people are talking about when they discuss the previous night's TV at work the next day. It's not intended to be a full-on recap, just five points to give you some reference.

1. Sun is having Jin's baby - there was some concern on Sun's part that she was carrying the child of her dead lover, given that Jin has a low sperm count and that they'd not been intimate for some time before the plane crash. Juliet, using equipment hidden in a room at Dharma Medical, confirms that the fetus was conceived on the island - thanks in no small part to the island's ability to quintuple sperm count.

2. Make that Sun is carrying Jin's baby, which is going to kill her before she can deliver - as you likely know, pregnant women on the island have a way of dying before they can deliver. By confirming that the fetus was conceived on the island, Juliet is pretty much passing a death sentence on Sun. She'll likely die before the end of her second trimester. Which, given the way time passes on this show, will be sometime in the ninth season. After they're done, Juliet tells Sun she's going back in to make sure their tracks are covered, but in reality she leaves a taped message for Ben about getting a sample from Sun, and that Kate is next. She also says she hates Ben, but after the recorded is turned off.

3. At least that's one less whore in Jin's life - the flashback part of the episode takes place just after Sun and Jin were married, when a woman approaches Sun in a park and says that if Sun doesn't pay her $100,000, she'll go public with Jin's background as the son of a fisherman and a prostitute. Given the shame that would cause Sun and her powerful family, Sun gets the money from her dad and pays the woman off - who, of course, is Jin's mother. Sun doesn't let her dad in on what's happening, and he claims that Jin will wind up paying off this debt by working for Mr. Paik directly. So we now know how Jin wound up becoming muscle for Paik.

4. He's not dead yet - meanwhile, the group that found the survivor from the helicopter crash also discover that she's been impaled by a branch, and is dying. As they squabble about taking her to Jack or running to get Jack, who should stumble across the group but Mikhail, the eyepatched caretaker of the Arrow station who had apparently died when being pushed through the Others' sonic fence (I assume he saw the flare that Hurley accidentally shot off). Mikhail was a medic in the Soviet army, and is able to patch up the survivor in return for his freedom - but not before he is caught trying to steal her broken sattelite phone.

5. But maybe the rest of them are? - the survivor (who has been speaking Spanish, Chinese, and Italian in her injured delerium) comes to, and asks Hurley where she is. He begins to explain about the island and the crash, and she perks up at mention of Oceanic 815. According to her, the wreckage of the plane was found, and there were no survivors. This takes Hurley aback, though it probably pleases everyone who has "the island is Purgatory" in the office pool.

Dialing for Dollars

So last night was the first part of the "Idol Gives Back" extravaganza that's taken over American Idol this week, and it went off pretty well, I think. There was a fair amount of footage of Ryan and the judges going places where there are people in need, mostly Ryan and Simon's trip to Africa but also vists to Louisiana, Kentucky, and a Los Angeles-area food bank that revealed - shockingly! - that there are indeed hungry people in America.

The singing, meanwhile, was pretty good overall. Melinda and Jordin continued their march towards the finals, while Phil continued to find that country suits him, even if his Garth Brooks didn't sound that twangy. Chris managed to combine nasal and Eric Clapton in a way that I found less irritating than normal, but not of any particular interest. Blake sang "Imagine," which I guess is inspirational if you're an anarchist. LaKisha took on Fanasia's Idol song, which is not that good of a song. Considering she's mentioned on a past results show that she was listening to Yolanda Adams, I can't figure out why she went with Fantasia's song - unless she thought that "I Believe" was the best she could do. Which is sad.

It's also why I think she'll go this week. It's the second week in a row where she's shown that she can't keep up with Melinda and Jordin, and she doesn't anything that really makes her unique, unlike Chris' nasal, Blake's beatboxing, or Phil's... baldness, I guess.

Tonight's a two hour star-studded extravaganza, where coincidentally many of the participants have an album coming out or are on a label that Clive Davis controls. Who knew?

Our Long National Whatever Is Over

I was surprised last night that Chris didn't wind up among the bottom three on American Idol, and was more surprised that Phil didn't, either. But what most surprised me was that we finally got to say goodbye to Sanjaya. I figured he was good for at least one more week.

And with him in our rear views now, I do wonder a bit why Sanjaya hit a nerve where other over-matched contestants of the past like Kevin Covais did not. He didn't seem as in on the joke as Chicken Little or John Edwards, but he wasn't totally oblivious to it, either. There was the weekly change of hair style, which became a thing only marginally less annoying that Ace Young's hat or Paul Kim's short-live performing in bare feet. And then there's Sanjaya's odd tweener status where gender is concerned, though if the pre-teens of the nation can reconcile his high voice and scraggly facial hair, anyone can.

In any case, I'm glad to see him go because he never should have been in the finals in the first place, but he was certainly helped by a fair amount of screen time prior to the semis. This show reaps what it sows, and will happily continue to do so as long as there's a bumper crop of ratings.

On an unrelated show note, I wasn't aware that there was some sort of dust-up over Simon looking like he was dissing Chris during his supportive remarks for folks down in Virginia. I saw this when it originally aired and didn't get that vibe, if only because Simon so often starts talking to the other judges during the contestant's remarks. Anyway, he explained what happened, and we were even given a split screen to show what happened. If nothing else, it was a good way to help fill another bloated results show.

Country When Country Isn't Cool

Given the lack of obvious country-types on this season of American Idol, last night's country theme seemed fraught. It wound up going better than expected, as both Melinda and Jordin returned to previous heights, while Phil had his best performance to date. Expect more country songs from him if he makes it through this week - I figure he'll make his usual visit to the bottom three but be safe (the Dial Idol folks list him as the only contestant assured of going through, but as they don't measure text voting I'm taking that with a grain of salt).

Some of the lowlights were expected - Sanjaya made a hash of "Let's Give 'Em Something to Talk About," while Chris nasaled his way through some song called "Mayberry." Odd that Simon would have chosen last night to comment on the nasal, given that Chris has been doing it all season.

The wife thinks Chris is a goner, and I'll agree with her once again. For the third member of the bottom three, I'd go with Sanjaya, but would not be surprised if it's Lakisha, whose version of "Jesus Take the Wheel" could have gone better.

I have no idea how they're going to pad the results out again this week, but I'm assuming Martina McBride will be doing at least two songs. That or we're getting more group sings. The horror.

J. Blo.

Jennifer Lopez was last night's guest host on American Idol, with a theme of Latin music. All in all, it was a pretty mediocre show. No one performance stood out (though Blake Lewis was probably the best of the night doing a Marc Anthony song, which I guess is fitting). J. Lo. herself was OK, not as good of a guest performance coach as Gwen Stefani or Lulu, but better than Diana Ross. She did help a few people with movement issues, which didn't seem to fully translate on to stage.

Anyway, the wife thinks Haley's going, and her performance of "Turn the Beat Around" was arguably the worst of the night. And while it didn't work for me last week, I'll copy her pick this week. I figure Phil Stacey will be in the bottom three - the guy lives there, doesn't he? - with Sanjaya, whose understated (and mostly in Spanish) performance of "Besame Mucho" may not connect with the 12 year olds who vote for him. Even if it was his best performance to date (which is not saying much).

Nothing New on Idol

Everyone sang pretty much according to their level of ability for once, though both Blake and Chris R. may have benefitted a bit more than the others from the theme: songs recorded by Tony Bennett. And given how long he's been recording, that's a list that comprises something like 28 percent of all music.

In any case, the good were still good and the bad were still bad. Sanjaya slicked his hair back and wore a white suit, the closest approximation to being male he's had all season (and even so, he needs a shave, badly; whatever fuzz he has looks terrible).

As for who goes, the wife is predicting Phil Stacey, and she's been spot on the last few weeks, so I'll steal her pick.

Thwarted

For the first time since the 2002-03 edition, I will not have picked a full slate of cancelled shows for the LaPlaca Open. ABC's batch of early pick-ups for next season included Men in Trees, the quirky Ann Heche drama that has apparently done well enough on Thursday to get renewed.

On the positive side (for me, at least) is that Trees was the second-most picked show among pool participants. So at least I'm not alone.

So how's the entry looking at this point?

Cancelled: Happy Hour. This is the only show on my list that has been formally cancelled. It was the top pick among all entrants, and I certainly wasn't the only one who put it on the top of their list, earning 10 bonus points.

On hiatus: Justice, Help Me Help You, Twenty Good Years. There are as good as cancelled, in my book, but it's not official until they don't appear on the schedule at upfronts.

MIA but not dead yet: The Class, What About Brian. Neither is currently airing, but both could get picked up. Though I doubt it.

Still airing - for now: King of Queens, According to Jim. The former is ending its run, so it's just waiting for it to go bye-bye. The latter is looking to be the first show to thwart me twice, as I had it in that dreaded 2002-03 pool. That it wasn't among the shows ABC renewed last month gives me hope. What doesn't give me hope is ABC's lack of depth with sitcoms, and how they can't seem to launch a new one to save their lives. That just may keep Jim around.

Yet to air: Notes From the Underbelly. I was worried that this was never going to air, as that scores no points. Thankfully, ABC is finding time on the schedule for it now, in an unusual back-to-back burn-off in Men in Trees's spot.

I'd like to think that all of these shows will be gone for 2007-08, but clearly there's a couple of shows that could linger. Which leads to the question: can I still win this thing?

I think the answer is yes, but I would need NBC to never air The Singles Table (which, at just six episodes, seems like good summer burn-off fodder, but let's keep our fingers crossed) and there are five or six shows whose return would really help, most notably The War at Home and Gilmore Girls. I think the latter will come back, but I'm dubious about the former.