As we open, Meredith is apparently acting as the spellmaster for the spelling bee; her voiceover tells us, "'Intimacy' is a four-syllable word for, 'Here are my heart and soul. Please grind them into hamburger.'" Oh, I was mistaken -- she's at home writing the monthly check to the nursing home where her mother is staying.
As the VO continues, Izzie walks into the bathroom where George is taking a shower. We get just a hint of pasty ass through the frosted glass of the shower door. George sees Izzie and freaks out. She grabs a toothbrush, starts to brush her teeth, and walks away. As she leaves, George sticks his head out of the shower and yells, "Is that my toothbrush?" I'm all for roommates walking around in their skivvies, but the fact that the first thought in George's head is that Izzie might be using his toothbrush tells me that Izzie has got some serious boundary issues.
Meredith has finished writing the check and preparing it for mailing. Still sitting at her desk, she picks up a picture album and flips through to a photo of her parents with Mere as a toddler. The VO tells us that intimacy comes attached to the three Rs: relatives, romance, and roommates. Izzie walks up behind Mere, still brushing her teeth. Mere looks at her, and we see that Izzie is wearing Japanese cartoon underpants. Mere: "Hello, kitty."
It's 4:30 a.m., and the roommates are in the parking lot of the hospital. George tells Izzie, "You don't understand. Me gonads, you ovaries." Someone send him back to medical school -- ovaries are gonads. Although maybe George is some kind of intersex person and he's not exactly sure what kind of gonads he has. George's gonad talk reminds Izzie that they are out of tampons; she asks George to pick some up when he does the shopping. (It is apparently his turn to do the shopping for the household). George forcefully tells them, "I am a man! I don't buy girl products!" And he doesn't want them walking into the bathroom in their undies while he's naked. Izzie tells him she doesn't care if he sees her in her underwear. I don't think it's Izzie's modesty that George is trying to protect.
In the locker room, Bailey tells the interns that when they examine the patients in the wee hours of the morning, they need to be polite and gentle when they wake them up and try to get them to share information on their condition, which will have the effect of preventing the interns from making Bailey look bad in front of the attendings. Bailey leaves, and Izzie approaches her locker (which is near Alex's). He calls her "Doctor Model," and she calls him "Doctor Spawn." He notices a little tattoo peaking out from the top of her pants and shines his tiny, inadequate little flashlight at it. He asks her if they airbrush the tattoo out for "the catalogues," and she asks him what they do for the "666 on [his] skull." So far the teasing is relatively playful, but Alex is still a pig.
Cut to George walking down a hallway. We see some male interns excitedly running into the locker room. George sticks his head in, and then Izzie walks up behind him. He tries to block her way into the room, but he thinks he's just continuing their fight and pushes her way past him. As she enters the locker room, the male interns start hooting and hollering at her. The walls are covered with dozens of copies of photos of Izzie in lingerie. Alex is hooting and hollering along with the others, but then he shuts them up and tells them to show some respect for Bethany Whisper. Alex: "I guess they do airbrush out the tattoo, don't they?" Izzie does a slow burn, and then asks Alex if he "really wants to see it." She pulls off her jacket and throws it at Alex, saying, "Let's look at that tattoo up close and personal, shall we?" And then she rips open her shirt and yells out, "And what are these? Oh my God, breasts. How does anybody practice medicine hauling these things around?" She pulls the barrette out of her hair and shakes it out. She pulls off her pants and notes that if she recalls her anatomy correctly, she has some glutes back there. "Let's gather 'round and check out the booty that put Izzie Stevens through med school." She asks Alex, "Have you had enough, or should I continue? Because I have a few more very interesting tattoos." Alex, shamefaced, does not respond. She walks up to him and tells him, "You want to call me 'Dr. Model?' That's fine. Just remember that while you're sitting on two hundred grand of student loans, I'm out of debt." She shoves Alex and storms out of the room (without bothering to get dressed). George offers to take the pix down, but she tells him not to bother. I would just like to point out that she never did show Alex the tattoo.
McDreamy examines Jorge to determine whether there's any neurological damage. He asks Jorge if he can remember what he had for breakfast on Monday. He can, because his wife makes him the same thing every day (a cheese omelet). I was joking before, but now I am starting to suspect product placement. Or a cheese fetish on the part of one of the show's writers. Husband and wife make cute noises about a cheese omelet being the only thing he likes to eat and the only thing she knows how to cook. McDreamy tells them that things look good, but he still needs an MRI to check for any residual bleeding.
Izzie walks into Creepy Masturbator's room and slaps down one of the copies of her ad. She tells him that the model is who she used to be and a doctor is what she is now, and she expects him to treat her the same as any of the other doctors. He tells her, "I'm sure you're a very good doctor." Izzie: "Then what is your problem?" He tells her that he's a creepy masturbator. Or rather, that he fantasized about Izzie's photos, and that seeing her just reminds him of the fact that he's about to very likely lose his ability to have a normal sex life. He also doesn't want the woman about whom he's fantasized to witness his emasculation.
Cristina and Burke are in the hallway outside Nurse Fallon's room. Cristina asks if Burke has seen the overnight labs. He has, and he agrees with her that everything looks bad. She asks why he hasn't scheduled the Whipple, and he responds, "Excuse me? Are you a surgeon now?" She points out that she's spending a lot of time taking care of Nurse Fallon, and she wants to do something to stop her from dying. He makes delaying noises about her biopsy, and Cristina tells him to shut up: "I think you never intended to do the Whipple. I think, I think this entire thing has been bull, and you're behaving like the only reason she's in this hospital is to die." He just looks at her, and she seems to realize that she just hit the nail on the head. Burke walks away from her.
Jorge is just coming out of the MRI. McDreamy is looking at the results, and notes that there is indeed a tumor in the hypothalamus. Mere and McDreamy are both pretty unhappy with the news. Commercials.
McDreamy is breaking the news to Jorge and his wife. He thinks the best practice is to operate to remove the tumor, but notes that he won't be able to get all of it. Thus, the surgery will have to be followed up with chemo and radiation, which will probably give Jorge five to ten "good years," but which won't ever cure the cancer. Jorge tells him he wants to go with the surgery, but McDreamy tells him that there's a serious downside. The tumor is located in part of the brain where Jorge's memory and "personality" reside, so the surgery could cause memory loss and completely change who he is as a person. There's some kind of less-invasive surgical option (which sounded like it involved radiation), but it would only give Jorge three to five years of life. McDreamy and Mere leave the two of them to make their decision.
Nurse Fallon is sleeping in her room. She opens her eyes to find Mere sitting off to one side looking at her. Nurse Fallon greets her warmly. Mere tells her, "I told my mother about you. She remembers you very well." Nurse Fallon thinks that makes perfect sense, as "Ellis Grey never forgot a thing." Mere takes that in for a second, and then starts laughing. After a minute, she apologizes to Nurse Fallon, explaining that it's not really funny. And then Nurse Fallon cuts through the crap by asking what Ellis's diagnosis is. As we know, it's early onset Alzheimer's. Nurse Fallon knows Ellis well enough to realize that she's making Meredith keep her condition a secret. Mere: "You know my mother well." Nurse Fallon: "What a bitch." That sets them both laughing.
Cristina is lounging around on some kind of metal wicker bench. Izzie is nearby, defending the decision to let Nurse Fallon die in the hospital to which she devoted so much of her life. Cristina just thinks it's a waste of a bed and her own time. Mere approaches and asks them what they're talking about. Cristina explains that Nurse Fallon was brought to the hospital so she could die. Izzie thinks it's what Cristina would want if she were in Nurse Fallon's shoes, but Cristina disagrees -- she'd want every possible step taken to keep her alive. And then Cristina uses her feet to pick up a copy of the magazine with Izzie's pix that is sitting on a nearby table. Dexterous. Burke, you are (or will soon be) one lucky fellow. She flips through the magazine until she comes to Izzie's ad. Cristina: "You are eight feet tall. Your boobs are perfect. Your hair is down to there. If I were you, I would walk around naked all the time. I wouldn't have a job, I wouldn't have skills. I wouldn't even know how to read. I just would be... naked." She passes the magazine to Mere, who seems to be seeing it for the first time. Mere starts laughing. Izzie blames her blinding beauty on makeup and retouching. Cristina: "You get that we hate you, right?" But Izzie clearly doesn't get that, because she's smiling for the first time that day. Izzie's pager goes off. It's Bailey, "again." Cristina points out that "any patient who spanks to his doctor's pictures forfeits his rights." She thinks Izzie shouldn't give up participating in Creepy Masturbator's surgery. Izzie doesn't answer, and Cristina, frustrated, shouts out, "You know, sometimes it's actually, you know, painful to be around you." This makes Izzie smile again as she walks away.
CM is being transferred to a gurney in his room. George is helping Bailey and some nurses. Izzie enters, and Bailey yells at her for not responding to her page, noting that she's assigned Izzie's prep work to George. Izzie makes an apologetic face to George as he wheels CM out of the room. Bailey tells Izzie, "If I hear the words 'Bethany Whisper' one more time..." Izzie tells Bailey that CM doesn't want her in the room, but Bailey tells her that what he really wants is not to have cancer. She says that it's Izzie's choice if she wants to stay in the scrub room.
Through a glass wall, we see McDreamy speak with Jorge and his wife. He leaves the room and tells Mere that they've decided to go ahead with the surgery. Mere seems unhappy with that decision.