By Omar G
It's Britney, bitches! Again! Brace yourselves. For the second time. Embrace the re-brace. It's not a re-tread, really! And I don't want to hear you guys complaining when she comes back a third time. Just call it a three-peat.
SagetTed is telling his kids about the streak of bad luck Barney was having when a mysterious woman was revealing his wicked ways to potential conquests. We see Barney at MacLaren's hitting on a lovely lady and offering to get her a drink. We see him come back and, as SagetTed helpfully explains, "He'd get slapped." SLAP! We cut to the pet store slap and the art gallery slap. We even see the hardware store slap. "Until finally," SagetTed says, Lily was approached by the woman who warned her to stay away from Barney. Not sure why we needed to see the part with Lily, but whatever. It's your flashback, SagetTed. We cut to the present time, as Barney gets slapped one more time at MacLaren's. "Again!?" he shouts, "REALLY!?" SagetTed says that this time Barney knew whom to look for. Barney turns toward the exit and sees a blonde walking out wearing a purple dress. He gives chase. Out of the bar. On to the street. Around the corner. He accosts a woman in a purple dress and asks if he slept with her and then totally screwed her over. "No," she says. He stops himself as he's about to run away to ask what she's doing on Friday. She gives him a dirty look, so Barney continues his pursuit of the other woman. He sees her duck into a cab. As the vehicle is about to take off, Barney dives onto the hood. He looks through the windshield. It's Britney Spears! Or rather, Stella's secretary. "Amy?" Barney asks. "Abby!" she corrects. "Riiiight," Barney says. Britney no likey.
Ba ba pa pa!
We see kids drawing in Lily's classroom. SagetTed explains to his kids that sometimes you can do something right 1,000 times, but still mess it up the 1001st time. We see a little girl bring Lily a drawing of a rainbow three times. Each time, she gives them warm praise. The fourth time, though, she gets an exasperated, "You're kidding me. Seriously, aren't you sick of these things?" Realizing what she just did (the little girl's face crumbles), Lily says, "Uh oh."
Cut to the apartment. Lily is wearing an oversized shirt (probably Marshall's) as she paints in the living room. Ted walks in and asks her how her day went. She says she yelled at a girl for painting a rainbow. Ted thinks that bitch must have had it coming. Marshall comes in with some bad news. The cost of fixing the floor in their new apartment is going to be a lot more than the estimate. Lily says they could barely afford the estimate price in the first place. Marshall says he hates to bring it up, but Lily might have to sell her stuff. "Whoa, Marshall, that's just a game we play in the bedroom." Not quite what he meant. Marshall means Lily's nuclear stockpile of designer clothes. Lily asks why Marshall's not selling his clothes. He thinks her Marc Jacobs cocktail dress will sell for more than his "Split happens" bowling shirt. Ted, however, sounds interested in the shirt. "I'm not selling that," Marshall whispers. Marshall says he already made a Website, Lilly-and-marshall-sell-their-stuff.com. Lily, upset, starts typing in what she thinks would be a better name for the Web site: Guy- forces-his-wife-to-dress-in-a-garbage-bag-for-the-nextthree-years.com. The three of them are shocked when an actual Web site comes up. "My word," Marshall says, "that woman is actually wearing a garbage bag." Lily doesn't think the girl can pull off a tall kitchen. I actually really love the song on that site. "Gaaaarbage bag..."
In the cab with Britney. Barney is adjusting his tie as he asks why Abby is trying to ruin his life. She's mad that he slept with her then never called. "And?" Barney asks. He thinks if he leaves her on dry land with transportation home, she shouldn't complain. Abby says she was hurt. It didn't help that Ted, the love of her life, started dating her boss. Britney's voice sounds a little strained, like maybe she has a cold or something. Barney's not sympathetic. "Oh boo hoo, poor little Ashley." Abby! Barney says he got dumped as Ted's wingman after seven years of being his best friend. Even Abby knows that Marshall is Ted's best friend. Barney interrupts her angrily, "Se-ven YEARS!" They both start grousing about Ted. His meaningful relationship with Stella. They hate Ted. Abby asks if Barney is as turned on as she. "Probably not as much," he says. Cut to the two of them in bed together, of course. Abby looks pretty flushed around the neckline. She's sorry she yelled out "Ted" during sex. Barney's sorry he yelled out "Abby." Because... that's her name... get it? Ha? No? Yeah, I guess the joke got run into the ground and run over by the cab a ways back.
Apartment. Ted, Robin, Marshall and Lily are going through all the designer clothes. Ted wonders if Lily's worn half of this stuff. Robin says she's sure Ted has something in his closet he hasn't worn. Annoyingly, he says, "Uh... as a matter of fact, there isn't." "Whatever, red cowboy boots!" Robin announces. Ted says those boots are nice and he can pull them off. Marshall asks Lily, who's coming in from another room, what article of clothing that Ted owns can he not pull off. She knows it's the red cowboy boots. Ted says it's a classic western look. Writers, start your gay cowboy joke engines. Robin: "The Good, The Bad and the Fabulous." Lily: "The Magnificent Kevin." Marshall: "No Country for Straight Men." Lily moans about not wanting to sell her clothes. Robin hugs her. She admires Lily's vest and asks if it's 100 percent silk. Marshall says they really need the money and until he gets his job, he doesn't know what else to do. Lily offers to sell her paintings. Marshall: "What?" Lily says a good oil painting sells for about $500. SagetTed breaks in to remind the kids about how you can do something right 1,000 times, but screw it up that 1001st time. Montage of Marshall telling Lily that her paintings are, "A masterpiece," worth staring at instead of the TV and museum-worthy. This time, though, he says, "That kind of money only goes for real paintings. Uh oh." Lily, hurt, asks what that means. Marshall explains that they need the money fast, and he doesn't know if her stuff will sell. "You don't believe in me!" she says. Lily says she's proud of her work and that her paintings are good. She thinks Robin would buy one. "What now?" Robin asks. She's luxuriating in Lily's clothes. Marshall says he's just trying to be realistic. He says they need $1,500 for the repairs. Honestly, for a nice New York City apartment, that doesn't sound like much. That's like, what, half of one month's mortgage? Lily thinks she can sell three paintings for $500 each and keep all her clothes. Robin looks guilty holding one of Lily's dresses. Marshall agrees reluctantly to give Lily a week. Spaghetti western music starts to play as Ted strides out from his bedroom. He puts a boot up on the coffee table. It's a ridiculously bright set of red cowboy boots. They look like galoshes. And his jeans are tucked in. Wow. Please do not come to Texas with those things, Ted. "Pulling. Them. Off," he says, confidently. Please do pull them off of your feet.
We return from commercials to see Lily standing in an art gallery. SagetTed says that Lily was accepting the Art Challenge of 2008 by displaying her painting in a friend's art gallery. Lily, wearing a weird tuxedo front blouse is standing in front of her piece, which has tons of bright colors and is surrounded by a huge, thick frame. People pass by her painting and don't give it a glance. A song called "The Painter" by I'm From Barcelona plays as the scene goes into fast motion. Either that or people really want to get away from Lily's painting as fast as possible. A woman finally stops in front of Lily. She's got gray hair and glasses. "I love it," she says. She looks rich, too. "You do?" she asks. The woman loves Lily's top and asks if it's 100 percent silk. "It's not for sale, my clothes are not for sale!" Lily yells, driving the lady off. Cut to the day as Lily is showing off her painting in a coffee house that displays art. Nobody's looking. She sits between Ted and Robin. Lily asks them to talk it up. Robin says nice things about the painting, all of them using the word "Neat." Ted says "Observe" and clears his throat. He gets all Know-it-all-Ted about the artwork, talking about the brushwork and the composition. He goes over the top with "an almost Kandinsky-like emotional resonance." Robin says you can enjoy it even if you're not a pretentious douche. Ted asks Robin if the colors are "Neat" or "Neato burrito." "Then again, red cowboy boots," she says. Ted is wearing them and has his feet propped up. "I pull these off!" he says. The coffee house titters in disagreement. Ted has the yell I tout again. Keep believin', dude.
Barney and Britney, er, I mean, Abby, are still in bed. Or maybe they got out of bed and got back in. It's hard to tell. "You know what I hate most about Ted?" she asks, "his stupid hair! His stupid, lame, awesome hair! It's so stupid and awesome!" It's very hard to tell if Britney is trying to play an annoying character or if she's just ignoring the character and speaking the lines as they would appear to someone on a page reading them for the first time. And I say that with all due respect. Barney asks if she knows what he hates about Ted. "WHAT?" she brays. Barney thinks it's lame that Ted wants to fall in love and care about the people he's in a relationship with. "He's so lame and awesome!" she says. Barney wants to show Ted how lame it is the way he acts in a relationship. Abby wants to show Ted that she's over him. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" she asks. Barney thinks so. "You're thinking about having sex with Ted?" she asks. Unfortunately, Britney runs over her own line, saying it way too fast for the joke to register. Barney just looks at her as if she's strange. It's not out of the realm of possibility that Barney was actually thinking that. That's what bro's are for.
Outside, artists are selling their stuff on the street. SagetTed says that after four days, of not selling a painting, Lily was getting desperate. We see her standing among the street artists trying to sell her huge, too-colorful painting. Are those psychedelic clotheslines? Nobody wants Lily's painting, especially not for $500. A guy standing nearby is selling "Tube sox" for $3. Hey, it's Matt Besser from Upright Citizen's Brigade! Love that guy! Lily complains that they don't even react. "Yeah, we're dirt to them," he says. He asks what Lily needs the money for. She says she's fixing the hardwood floors in her new apartment. She asks what he needs. "Heroin," he says. She asks if he likes heroin. "Love it," he says. He admits that if Lily sells her painting, he'll take her money. To buy heroin. She thanks "Crazy sock guy" for his honesty. "I'm never gonna sell this, am I?" she asks. "It's not very good," Sock Guy says immediately.
Just a little while later, Lily is hailing a cab to take herself and her painting away. A gay couple notices the painting. How do I know they're gay? Because in TV Stereotype Land, they dress way better than me, are incredibly fit, and say things like, "Oh my God!" as they lean in provactively. Quick cut to MacLaren's where Lily is throwing down money on the booth table. She got her $500. "Who's the real painter now, Marshall?" she asks. She offers to draw him an Aldrin Original on a napkin to thank him for being a supportive husband. "I'm thinking about calling it... SUCK IT." The napkin says, of course, "SUCK IT!!" Marshall says he's proud and asks who bought it. Lily says it was a gay couple without kids. A G-CWOK. Ted is impressed. That's the heart and soul of the art buying community. Ted suggests that Lily call up the G-CWOKs and have them throw a private art party for their friends in exchange for a free painting. Lily goes to call them. But not before telling Marshall to "Suck it!" one more time. Just then, Barney and Abby enter, holding hands. They're wearing sickeningly matching cyan sweaters. Marshall is also wearing Buddy Holly glasses. Abby is carrying a ginormous black purse. Barney pretends it's an accident they're running into Ted and Marshall. He asks if they've met his girlfriend Abby. Ted asks if they're dating now. Barney says he's done with this whole "Being awesome thing." Barney says he's all about farmers' markets, day hikes and matching khaki shorts. Abby agrees. She says girlfriends are lame, except her. Also, she whispers, she misses Ted. Barney says they're in love. Not passionately, just "Couple love." He says it involves movie night and then waiting for her to go to bed so he can have one fleeting moment of hollow ecstasy in front of the computer monitor. All right, that's pretty funny. "We're showing Ted how lame he is," Abby announces. Barney tells her she doesn't have to say it. She makes a weird face. Ted says he knows what's going on after Abby says his hair looks amazing. He asks them to stop. Barney tells his "Pookie Bear" that he's so pathetically desperate for her that... he gets on his knee and asks her to marry him. He presents her with a ring. She asks if he's serious. Barney says he would never joke about true love. Ted rolls his eyes. Abby agrees to marry him as the whole bar erupts into applause. Abby goes to call her mom as Barney chuckles. Then he gets totally serious. "That's you," he says, pointing at Ted. Ted thinks Abby doesn't get the joke. Abby is telling her mother that it finally happened. She only wishes her dad were alive to walk her down the aisle. "Totally committed to the bit," Barney says, pointing toward Abby. In another corner of the bar, Lily is calling her G-CWOK friends. The man who answers, she says, sounds really happy. "Are you kidding? We're popping the champagne right now!" I hope that's not a euphemism. Or maybe I don't. I'm so confused by my conflicting desires right now. Lily offers the dude a chance to view some of her other paintings. "Oh, honey, oh sweetie, oh..." he says. It turns out they only bought the painting for the frame. It's an original Anton Kreutzer, very rare. Lily asks if they didn't like her painting. "Oh honey, oh sweetie, no, not at all," he says, "but good for you!" Lily asks if she can get the painting back. They don't have it anymore. Lily figures out that they threw it out. She's devastated as she tells Marshall. Just then, Barney buys a round of champagne for the whole bar. He slyly tells the bartender to give everyone ginger ale. "It's a bit," he says.
Commercials. It's a coincidence that they ran the ad about depression medication during the Britney episode, right? Just checking.
Apartment. Lily is on her laptop and Robin is playing with her cell phone. Lily is upset that her dream of being an artist is dead and now she's watching all her clothes get sold. Her computer does a chime. Her favorite dress, which she's holding in her hands, just got sold. She has a flashback to when she wore it in the spring of 2004, after a hard few months. We side-whoosh to see Lily walking down the street. A guy reading a book just outside a bookstore watches her go and says, "Daaaaaamn!" Lily smiles and keeps walking. In the present day, Lily says that she got a two-syllable damn. "That's the dream," Robin agrees. Lily looks at her screen to see who bought the dress. "CanadaGirl@metronewsone.com." Busted! Lily throws the dress at Robin. Robin says she's keeping it in the family, at least. Marshall and Ted enter the apartment, grinning. Something amazing happened. Marshall says he went to the G-CWOK's apartment. He says he felt guilty. Marshall's hair just keeps getting floppier and floppier. If we didn't know he was going bald, I'd swear he was going to grow up to be Edward Herrmann. Ted says he loved the painting and didn't want to see it in the trash. We side-whoosh to the G-CWOK apartment. Immediately, Marshall is getting hit on. "Talk about a nice frame!" Blonde Gay Dude says to Marshall. He notices that Marshall is married to "that little bit of a thing" and asks how that works. I've always wondered that myself! "I'd like to find out," he tells Marshall. Back at the apartment, Lily says that we get it: gay guys like Marshall. Marshall feels the need to clarify: "No. Lily. They LOVE me." Back at the G-CWOKs: Ted, who has been scoping the apartment, decides that this guy has impeccable taste and style. He asks about the red boots, which he's wearing. Blonde Gay Guy looks down and calls for his mate, Walter. "Boots," he says simply. Walter looks down. "Pulling. Them. Off," he says, after a long pause. Yes! Awesome! I hate the boots, but I love the verdict! I have betrayed my own judgment and it rules! Ted, satisfied, smiles. He walks out as the spaghetti western music plays again. In the apartment, Ted puts his boot foot up on the table. "G-CWOK-approved," he says. But back to the painting. Marshall is hunting in the Dumpster for the painting. It was gone. But the superintendent told Marshall that a vet named Dr. Greer took the painting. Lily asks why the guy took her painting. Marshall leads her out of the apartment so she can find out.
Dr. Greer's office. Dr. Greer is the awesome Larry Wilmore, the Senior Black Correspondent from The Daily Show. (I love him best for his work on the very underrated Bernie Mac Show.) I can't do his tiny bit justice, but he does tell Lily that he was having a busy day that involves lots of neutering (not to worry; mostly dog testicles). We see him find the painting in the Dumpster. "Heeey, free painting!" he says, in that scene and also in voiceover. He looks both ways to make sure nobody sees him, even though it's a painting in a Dumpster. We see him hang up the painting in Exam Room 3. A Chihuahua is brought in and barks angrily from the last time he was brought in. (Snip-snip!) In the exam room, though, the dog sits and stares at the painting. The dog, a dead ringer for Lady Bird from King of the Hill named Tidbit, is also staring. Then another dog named King Larry. And the Weinstein triplets, three Dalmatians. It shouldn't be funny, but watching these damn dogs stare at that damn painting is pretty hilarious. Especially with Larry Wilmore watching from the doorway. He tells Lily that her paintings speak to the canine sensibility on a primal level. Birds, however, get bummed out. Dr. Greer says a parrot saw the painting, got out of its cage and threw itself at the ceiling fan. Marshall says that he convinced the doctor to buy four more paintings. At $500 each. Instead of using it for the repair, though, Marshall wants to reinvest the money in Lily.
At the apartment, Lily is painting and Marshall is on the computer. He's built a Web site to sell Lily's paintings to veterinarians. Lily thanks Marshall for believing in her. Just then, a bird flies into the window, near the painting. "Man. Birds do NOT get you!" Marshall says.
Abby's place. Barney shows up as Abby is cutting out wedding ideas from magazines. Barney, distant, is looking for a tie he might have left there. She starts going on and on about the wedding planning. She asks if the wedding cake should be Fudgie the Whale or Cookie Puss. Barney insists that it was just a bit. Abby ignores that and asks if they should get married on Labor Day. She doesn't want to detract attention from America by having it on the 4th of July. Barney thinks, and comes up with a solution. He says he can't marry Abby. "Ted begged me not to because he's in love with you!" Brilliant! Barney gives her Ted's home address. He says Ted works late, so not to show up before 2 or 3 in the morning. She feels bad about keeping Barney's ring. It's just candy. He takes a piece off and eats it. "Later!" he says. Evil music plays as she stares at the address.
After the episode, Jason Segel and Alyson Hannigan ask us to visit Lilyandmarshallselltheirstuff.com"> or charityfolks.com to buy stuff from the show. It'll benefit a children's hospital in L.A. Get to it! See you week.
-- Omar G. is a journalist and comic living in New Braunfels, Texas. You can find him on Terribly Happy, Space Monkeys! and at Videogamey.com.