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“Grey’s Anatomy” minicap 617: “Push”

They say the only thing constant is change. Over time, the denizens of Seattle Grace Mercy West have shown they are all about change. McDreamy and Dark n’ Twisty are happily married. Callie has forsaken her hetero f— buddy ways and has a loving relationship with a lovely lady. The Chief is in AA and Lexie dyed her hairs. And now, Mark is starting to realize “Wham, bam, thank you, ma’am” are Bowie lyrics, and not a way of life. Did you feel that? Hell just froze over.

Callie stops by BFF Mark’s place to find him sad and lonely. She suggests he try something new and foreign to him: “Find a grown-up who wants what you want, and date, like a grown-up.” Simple advice, but if it was that easy, eharmony would be a website about barbershop quartets.

At the hospital, Owen has a patient with a seemingly inoperable tumor the size of a football. Webber happens by, and smelling the sweet aroma of glory wafting from the woman’s room, tries to steal the surgery, using his age to garner some sympathy. Cristina has a good nose too, but hers can detect bulls— from the lobby. After hearing Webber’s On Golden Pond speech, she clues Owen in to the fact that Webber is trying to steal his thunder. Take back the knife, Red.

Derek sees Owen and Webber wrestling over the patient’s chart and suggests a little competition. They’ll each present him with their plans for treatment, and may the best doctor win. Meredith and Cristina will get to assist, just for standing there. Cristina jumps in and announces she’s on Team Webber.

Owen: “I’m with Webber”? Why did you push me to do this in the first place?

Cristina: Now you’ll know what your plan is, and what his plan is.

Owen: What? You’re going to spy on him? That’s cheating.

Cristina: You’re adorable when you’re slow.

Owen: You have a dark, dark mind.

Cristina Yang for the win.

Down the hallway, handsome, assured Ben the gas man is getting his flirt on with Bailey. He asks if she has plans for the evening. Bailey says she’s going to give yoga a whirl, thanks to her “fascist vegan” neighbor. Bailey lives next to a lesbian?

Teddy’s Case of the Week involves a patient whose heart has drifted out of place, following a lung removal. Apparently, all our inside junk is strategically packed to hold everything in position. But when there’s a void, our hearts fall out of place. That’s called metaphor. Teddy suggests using breast implants to fill the emptiness. That’s called Anna Nicole Smith.

Teddy seeks out Mark to discuss implants. At first, he’s confused and thinks she wants implants.

“Good for you! You know, it crossed my mind the first time I saw you, but I didn’t think you were the type to go for it,” he says. Teddy explains she’s talking about an implant for a patient. Is there a surgeon in the house to remove Mark’s foot from his yap?

Callie sees them consulting together and pulls Mark aside to share her bright idea: they should date. Teddy is age-appropriate (as if that’s a good thing) pretty, smart, and probably wants kids. She’s perfect for a serious relationship with Mark 2.0. Mark asks Teddy if it’s a bad time to ask her to dinner. Because ya know, her breasts are fine. Strange as it seems, she says “No.”

Moments later, Teddy tells Arizona about Mark’s invite with a little disbelief and a whole lot of eww. Like Callie, Arizona thinks it’s a great idea, too, but for different reasons. She tells Teddy to think of Mark like candy: fun, empty calories that can be eaten and forgotten. Great. There’s no way this is going to go badly.

Callie is still playing Cupid when Bailey tells her that Ben invited her over for dinner. A home-cooked meal served up by a hottie will kick Downward Dog’s ass every time. Callie informs Bailey that this being their third date, sex is on the menu. Bailey scoffs nervously, “It is possible to eat, and go home, and not lose your pants in the process.”

Now she tells me.

Bailey’s been out of the dating game for a long time and isn’t quite sure what the etiquette is these days.

Bailey: But if it does go that way, am I supposed to sleep over?

Callie: Oh, no. No. Sex on the couch. Walk of shame under the cover of darkness.

Bailey: Do I wear a dress?

Callie: Nuh uh. Casual — like you don’t expect it’s going to happen, but you’re ready for it to happen.

Bailey: How ready?

Callie: Like, you’ve prepped the surgical field…

Bailey: [realizing] Oh Torres!

Callie gives Bailey the number of a Ukrainian woman who can landscape her garden. Bailey is appalled, but takes that number and shoves it into her pocket anyway.

Everyone has different ideas about what should be going on “down there.” Some like their Area 51 completely barren, while a few still prefer a natural density usually associated with the Amazon Basin. Whether you’re into the Martini Glass, the Landing Strip, the Mohawk or the Postage Stamp, hearts, diamonds or lightning bolts, hairstyle says something about your personality and shouldn’t stop at your shoulders. So, vajazz it up! And really, who doesn’t like a clean work surface?

Elsewhere, Arizona is dealing with parents whose child-rearing technique consists of blaming each other for the smallest failure to protect their son from the hazards of normal, everyday life. The kid has an internal infection, and clearly, one of them is going to take the rap for it. The accusations start flying. While these two keep their kid away from germs, sharp edges, free time and the slightest disappointment, who’s going to protect him from them? A broken arm might ruin his summer, but parents like that will ruin his life.

And in case you’re wondering whatever happened to Valley Girl, Moon Unit Zappa, here’s your answer.

Like, oh my God, like, totally.

After some tests, Arizona determines the boy has a cyst that ruptured. The cyst can be hereditary and the rupture was probably caused by a hug. Goodie. More finger pointing.

Who cares about that when Teddy and Mark was busy misreading each other? Thanks to Callie and Arizona’s fine advice, Mark wants dinner and real conversation, and Teddy wants drinking and man candy.

Lexie and Alex are unaware of Mark’s epiphany. They’re still under the impression he cares what they’re doing, which is each other. Alex fears for his life, while Lexie doth protest too much, methinks. Why can’t he just move on, as she has? (She hasn’t.) Cristina mocks her by saying, “You’re just that good, little Grey. There’s no getting over you.” Lexie leaves in a huff.

Meredith and Cristina laugh at the teenager. Kids today.

Tumor Competition Update: Webber may be playing the addled senior card, but he’s onto Cristina’s spying. He turns her into a double agent by bribing her with a key role in the operating room. Benedict Yang gets Owen to tell her his surgical strategy, but reveals none of Webber’s. Meredith knows Cristina all too well and warns Owen his girlfriend has switched sides. You just can’t trust Asians.

Bailey’s back from her lunch hour waxing appointment. She finds Callie in the lab, trying to create cartilage out of Jell-O.

Callie asks how the waxing went.

Bailey: She held up two postage stamps and asked me if I was looking for the 44-cent or the three.

Callie: Um, you don’t have to tell me which one you picked.

Bailey: I left! Let me tell you a little something about my surgical field, OK? I prep my surgical field with soap and water. I keep my surgical field the way God made it. Yeah. I don’t need a member of the Ukrainian KGB waxing it smooth so it can be mistaken for the surgical field of a 5-year-old girl. I am a woman. A woman was meant to have something on her surgical field. If a man can’t deal with a little something on the surgical field — a little nature, a little God — then that man has no business getting near my surgical field.

Callie: Fine. I’m not putting a gun to your head. Let freedom ring.

Is this episode called “Push,” or “Bush”? I’m not sure anymore.

In medical news, Derek awards the tumor competition to Owen, thinking his exploratory, cut-as-you-go plan is more flexible than Webber’s old school strategery. Owen runs into some trouble during surgery and calls for some Webber back up. Young and old work together, proving the only generation gap is between their ears. And now, back to our vaginas, already in progress.

Bailey has a lot on her mind and pages Callie to an empty room to talk about condoms. Who brings them? Where does she get some? What color goes best with her eyes? Why she’s asking the lesbian is anyone’s guess, but Callie is Bailey’s dating guru today. Callie tells her a girl can’t rely on the guy, so go grab a handful from the clinic. Bailey would rather clear-cut her rainforest than be seen with a fist full of Trojans, so she asks Callie to get them for her.

After Callie finishes shoring up Bailey’s confidence, she turns her attention to Mark, who may be pretty and not without bedroom skills, but is as unsure about dating as any mere mortal. “You’re a good guy,” she says sincerely, “You’re worth getting to know, in daylight.”

Mark sighs, wondering if she’s right. Callie flits off to end the war in Afghanistan.

Seriously, Callie is having a really great day. Arizona keeps her company in the lab, watching her work on her experiment. Callie shakes a test tube and sees her creation has turned from a liquid to a solid. She’s done it: Jell-O is now viable joint cartilage. From the cafeteria to a knee near you. Arizona beams with pride. Callie is just as happy she’s now the go-to girl for the lovelorn.

Arizona: You’re amazing.

Callie: We’re amazing. We’re the stable couple everyone wants to be. I mean, I can just see us 10 years from now in a big ol’ house with kids running around, and giving sage, sane advice to Mark Sloan, who will still be single.

Arizona: [laughs] Well, I’m in for all of it, but the kids.

Callie: What?

Arizona: No kids. And by “no kids,” I mean, yikes! No to the kids.

Callie: You’re joking, right? I mean, you’re in pediatrics.

Arizona: Yeah, exactly…

Uh oh.

Arizona says she’s seen enough terror in the eyes of her patients’ parents to never want that for herself. But she likes dogs, and even has a thing for chickens. Arizona’s tone is so blasé and dismissive, you’d think she was telling a waiter to hold the onions. Callie is speechless.

If television has taught us anything, it’s that no one stays happy for very long.

Teddy approaches Mark and tells him she’s changed her mind. She’d love to have dinner with him. Mark says he’s not taking her to dinner. They’ll have lunch, in broad daylight, instead.

Mark: I want to build a life, and a family. And I’m not wasting my time on someone who doesn’t share that interest.

It’s just lunch. Lighten up, lesbian.

That night, it’s Bailey’s turn to take a dip in the dating pool. As Ben prepares dinner, Bailey surveys his apartment with an awkward, sweeping glance and fiddles with her wine glass, grateful to have something to do with her hands. For his part, Ben is smooth and calm and easy as Sunday morning. He starts to tell Bailey an anecdote about the grilling in the rain but she can’t hold it in anymore. Shaking her hair proudly, she blurts out “OK, look. I don’t do things because there’s a time line… I don’t play by anyone’s rules other than my own.”

Gentle Ben smiles, bemused, and tells her he’s not afraid of her lectures and orders. There’s this thing called a conversation. Perhaps she’s heard of it? Bailey’s met her match in Billy Dee Williams.

At the hospital, Lexie hears that Mark is taking Teddy out to lunch to get to know her. It hits her that Mark has moved on. He’s really gone. She breaks down in the ladies’ room while Meredith watches helplessly and dries her hands. Oh boy.

Now it’s Lexie’s turn to find love within the confines of that nutty hospital. Who’s left, besides Alex, I mean? Two words: Jackson Avery.

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