Lines in the Sand (House episode)
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| House episode | |
| "Lines in the Sand" | |
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| Episode no. | HOU-304 |
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| Airdate | September 26, 2006 |
| Writer(s) | David Hoselton |
| Director(s) | Newton Thomas Sigel |
| Guest star(s) | Heather Kafka as Sarah Geoffrey Blake as Dominic Braeden Lemasters as Adam Leighton Meester as Ali Stephanie Venditto as Nurse Brenda Previn |
| All House episodes | |
Lines in the Sand is the fourth episode of the third season of House and the fiftieth episode overall.
Contents |
[edit] Synopsis
Adam, who is severely autistic, is learning shapes and words in his backyard. His father, Don, is trying very hard to show Adam words, but Adam seems more interested in drawing lines on his chalkboard. While eating his lunch, Adam begins to choke and scream loudly. Adam's doctor is Dr. House (Hugh Laurie). In light of House's actions in response to the recarpeting of his office, insisting the old carpet be returned, he soon finds himself under a house observation by much of the main staff, doctors, and even his own team of young diagnosticians; all are derivations in "the line of reasoning" to House's monotonic inference.
While House is doing the differential diagnosis for Adam, he notices that his blood-stained carpet has been taken out. He goes to complain to Cuddy, who has no intentions of indulging House's request. As a result, House refuses to work in his office. He begins to work in other people's offices during the course of the episode. While House is complaining to Cuddy, the rest of House's team tries to strap Adam down and get him into an MRI machine. After the MRI, Chase and Cameron go to Adam's house to run tests. Foreman tells House that all the tests are negative. Then, House holds a meeting in the clinic, and orders his team to get a stool sample. During the sample, Adam has another fit and coughs up fluid from his lungs. House moves into Wilson's office after he is evicted by Cuddy, and Wilson is not happy. The team finds a heart problem. House brushes this off and continues with his diagnosis. House's team takes a biopsy of the lymph node under Adam's arm per the suggestion of Foreman, and find that there are liver cells under his arm. Another differential in Wilson's office shows that Adam's liver may be damaged and is flowing into the lymphatic system, and was deposited in the underarm lymph node. House then moves to Cuddy's office for the differential and discusses the calcium carbonate in Adam's stool when House is evicted by Cuddy again, because she tells House that Adam is in a cardiac intensive care unit. Adam is stabilized and House discusses the possibility of Pica, and suspects that Adam put something unnatural in his mouth. He orders his staff to get samples from the house. While searching the house, Cameron finds jimson weed, and suspects that might be the source of the problem. However, House is skeptical.
House finally makes a connection and stops the surgery to remove Adam's eye and shows that he has worms floating in his eye, and in other parts of his body. This is due to Adam eating sand with raccoon feces inside.
[edit] Diagnosis
Adam was diagnosed with raccoon roundworms, which caused his heart, lung, and liver problems, and his right eye to roll back into his head. He got the roundworms after eating contaminated sand from the sandbox in his backyard.
[edit] Medical Terms
- Coccidioidomycosis (caused by fungal spores)
- Baylisascaris procyonis
- Pica
- Coccidioides immitis
- Myalgia
- Fungal Meningitis
- Autism
- Asperger syndrome
[edit] Clinic Patients
Ali: A daughter of a clinic patient in the last episode, who has an obvious crush on House. She tracks down House by visiting the clinic, flirting heavily with him and even flashing him at one point (the short exchange between them is cut short by Foreman). Cuddy tells House that Ali is stalking him and that she will call security. As House is leaving for the night, he finds Ali sitting on his motorcycle. She continues flirting, mentioning that the age of consent is fourteen in Iceland and that it's just an arbitrary number. However, Cuddy interrupts their exchange again and sends Ali on her way. Cuddy lies to House, trying to get him away from Ali, but then cracks under House's pressure and reveals that Ali is locked in her office and House should talk her out of what she is doing. House tells her that she suffers from Coccidioidomycosis, caused by the fungal spores of Coccidioides immitis in her brain, which she inhaled during an earthquake in Fresno. House says as most of her symptoms developed in her head, it may be that the spores are mostly concentrated in her sinuses and the Frontal lobe of her cerebral cortex, most likely due to sniffing a flower coated in a loose dust-like film of the spores, headaches, cough and her flawed judgement. However, impaired judgement is not a symptom of Coccidioidomycosis, and was likely invented by House (given his apparent and subsequent over acting of disappointment) as a means to get rid of her.
The Constipation Woman: a woman who has constipation finally can use the bathroom, but she cannot recognize what it is in the toilet. She wraps it in tissue paper and wants House to take a look.
The Back Pain Man: a man cannot fix his back pain problem after many failed treatments. Suddenly he does not feel pain anymore and he figures he needs to go to the hospital.
[edit] Arc advancement
[edit] Happenings
House comments several times on the difficulty of raising autistic children, and acts fascinated with the prospect of a patient who cannot lie, if only because the patient scarcely communicates at all. He even says he claims envy for the child's freedom from social rules and artificial pleasantries. He also wonders about the parents, about how their emotional condition and hopes for their son deteriorated as the great potential of his life, as any child has great potential, faded away into his illness. The patient, while considered emotionally and intellectually vegetative because of autism, nevertheless forms an undeniable affection for House, offering him a hand held video game console (a PSP) as a gift and, at least as surprising, maintaining several seconds of direct eye contact with the doctor. Avoiding all eye contact constitutes one of the earliest and strongest developmental symptom of autism.
Wilson deceives Dr. Cuddy, theorizing House might have Asperger Syndrome, a condition where patients appear normal but have pathological issues with social conventions, obsessive and/or repetitive interests, and sometimes uncontrollably obsess over changes outside their control-like the removal of House's bloodstained office carpet. While House resembles the symptoms, Wilson denies the diagnosis when speaking with him. Telling her he will replace the carpet at his own cost, Wilson reveals a deeper investment in the situation. Perhaps he believes House implacable unless ultimately heeded, perhaps he just wants his office back (admittedly an excellent reason), but the situation suggests Wilson's deeper sympathy for House, especially since Wilson fully realizes House commandeers his office for the express purpose of creating additional, peripheral pressure on Dr. Cuddy.
[edit] Self References
- Informed Consent: Ali, who expresses her interest on House in this episode, develops her crush in that episode.
- Control: House asks Cameron why she does not "accept [him] for [him]" like any "other age inappropriate girl who has a thing for me". Cameron expresses her interest in House in that episode.
[edit] Trivia
[edit] Allusions and References
- The Wizard of Oz: House greets the sight of the parasites with a cry of "Hello, my pretties…". This echos the cackling greeting of the Wicked Witch of the West played by Margaret Hamilton from the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz.
- Casablanca: House recites the famous last scene from the film Casablanca in an effort to get Ali to leave. This dialogue is also a fitting explanation for why they can't continue their relationship.
- Dog Day Afternoon: While trying to convince Cuddy to give him back his carpet, House shouts "Attica, Attica!", which is a reference to the 1975 movie Dog Day Afternoon. The character played by Al Pacino named Sonny Wortzik used the cry as a battle chant.
- Henry Gray's Anatomy of the Human Body: House says "So, think maybe Gray's Anatomy got it all wrong?". It is a reference of Henry Gray's Anatomy of the Human Body, an anatomy textbook widely regarded as a classic work on human anatomy.
- "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds": Foreman says "Our kid's been tripping on 'Lucy in the Sky with Cubic Zirconium'." It is a reference to The Beatles' "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds", a song that many speculate was written in reference to LSD, a drug which John Lennon in particular had been using heavily at the time. It also refers to the fact that jimson weed is a cheap alternative to LSD, similar to cubic zirconium being a cheap diamond substitute.
- Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore: House asks Adam to recognize what he eats with cards. He shows a card of backyard, says "This is your backyard--you may know it as Mel’s Diner". This is a reference of Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore, a movie which character Mel Sharples (Vic Tayback) owned a diner.
- Blade: After Cuddy tells Ali to leave, House spins his cane and puts it on his back just like Blade does with his sword in the Blade movies.
- Dreamcatcher: During the lymph node biopsy House enters the room and breathes N2O gas. The patients mother asks what are you doing. House replies "Eating the red berries." This is a possible reference to the Stephen King book and movie based on the book "Dreamcatcher".
[edit] Quotes
- Foreman: “I had a date last night. She screamed too. You think we should spend a hundred thousand dollars testing her?”
House: “Of course not. This isn’t a veterinary hospital. Zing!”
- House: “Go up his rear and get a smear. Which reminds me, kinda feel like a bagel.”
- House: "Exactly when did New Jersey run out of horny 17 year old boys?"
Ali: "About five weeks ago. It's been very lonely."
- House: “After that look, I’m feeling a little frisky and looks like you’re up.”
Cuddy: “I’m ovulating. Let’s go.”
House: “The frisky, it went away.”
- House: “If I leave her alone, can I have my carpet back?”
Cuddy: “No.”
House: “If I forget about my carpet can I have her?”
- House: (to Cuddy and pressed against a glass door) "You can't stop our love!!!"
- Wilson: "You do not suffer from Aspergers syndrome. You just wish you did. It would exempt you from the rules, give you freedom, absolve you from responsibility. Most importantly of all, it would mean that you're not just a jerk."
- Cameron: "Is it so wrong for them to want to have a normal child? It's normal to want to be normal."
House: "Spoken like a true circle queen. See, skinny, socially privileged white people get to draw this neat little circle. And everyone inside the circle is 'normal'. Anyone outside the circle needs to be beaten, broken and reset so that they can be brought into the circle. Failing that, they should be institutionalized. Or even worse - pitied."
Cameron: "So it's wrong to feel sorry for this little boy?"
House: "Why would you feel sorry for someone that gets to opt out of the inane courteous formalities which are utterly meaningless, insincere and therefore degrading. This kid doesn't have to pretend to be interested in your back pain, your secretions or your grandma's itchy place. Imagine how liberating it would be to live a life free of all the mind numbing social niceties. I don't pity this kid - I envy him."
[edit] Music
"Waiting on an Angel" by Ben Harper: Closing Scenes, Adam gives House his cherished PSP and House gets his old carpet back.
[edit] References
[edit] External links
- FOX.com-House official site
- Television Without Pity-House recaps
- House Episode Guide at epguides.com
- TVGuide's Page: Full list of House Episodes
- House M.D. Guide
- "House M.D." IMDB Profile
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| Episode list | Awards | Soundtrack | |
| Cast and crew | |
|---|---|
| David Shore | Hugh Laurie | Lisa Edelstein | Robert Sean Leonard | Omar Epps | Jennifer Morrison | Jesse Spencer | |
| Characters | |
| Gregory House | Lisa Cuddy | James Wilson | Eric Foreman | Allison Cameron | Robert Chase |
