Future LEGO Crafts projects

I need to build one of these:


And maybe a pair of sunglasses while I'm at it.



My journey towards the geek side will then be complete.

"Rafael Football League"

Stongbad's Mount Ridesplace USA!

The Maladies of House

These days, I only watch two primetime shows: Lost and House. Most people have seen or at least know a little bit about Lost, but House is still relatively unknown, despite being a ratings success.

For those of you who don't watch, the show focuses on Dr. Gregory House (Hugh Laurie), a brilliant diagnostician who works at the Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital. The basic formula for each episode has him and staff being presented a patient with a bizarre combination of symptoms. They must figure out what the exact cause of the patient's ailments is before he or she dies from them.

Watching this show and listening to all the obscure (as well as common) ailments that emerge as the culprits, I wonder if their medical well will ever run dry. Probably not, but for the sake of my love of the show and my love of research, I've decided to do a complete episode listing with the responsible afflictions listed for each one. Enjoy!


(WARNING: As should be obvious, this list pretty much contains spoilers for every episode that has aired so far. Some of these have such obscure names that it won't matter if you know it or not. Others, like 2-13, is a dead giveaway for what the final twist is.)


Season One

1-1: Pilot - Tapeworm

1-2: Paternity - Subacute Sclerosing Panencephalitis

1-3: Occam's Razor - Colchicine Poisoning

1-4: Maternity - Echovirus 11

1-5: Damned If You Do - Copper Allergy (via IUD)

1-6: The Socratic Method - Wilson's Disease

1-7: Fidelity - African Sleeping Sickness

1-8: Poison - Pesticide Poisoning

1-9: DNR - Arterial Venous Malformation

1-10: Histories - Rabies

1-11: Detox - Acute Naphthalene Toxicity

1-12: Sports Medicine - Cadmium Poisoning

1-13: Cursed - Leprosy

1-14: Control - Bulimia

1-15: Mob Rules - Ornithine Transcarbamylase Deficiency

1-16: Heavy - Cushing's Syndrome

1-17: Role Model - Common Variable Immunodeficiency

1-18: Babies & Bathwater - Small Cell Lung Cancer

1-19: Kids - Thrombotic Thrombocytopenic Purpura

1-20: Love Hurts - Fulminating Osteomyelitis

1-21: Three Stories - (a) Flesh-eating "Strep" Bacteria, (b) Cancerous Tumor and (c) Aneurysm

1-22: The Honeymoon - Acute Intermittent Porphyria


Season Two

2-1: Acceptance - Pheochromocytoma

2-2: Autopsy - Blood Clot

2-3: Humpty Dumpty - Psittacosis

2-4: TB or Not TB - Pancreatic Tumor

2-5: Daddy's Boy - Radiation Sickness

2-6: Spin - Thymoma

2-7: Hunting - Echinococcosis

2-8: The Mistake - Hepatoma

2-9: Deception - Clostridium Perfringens

2-10: Failure to Communicate - Cerebral Malaria

2-11: Need to Know - Adenoma

2-12: Distractions - Serotonin Storm

2-13: Skin Deep - Testicular Cancer

2-14: Sex Kills - Gonorrhea

2-15: Clueless - Heavy Metal (Gold) Poisoning

2-16: Safe - Tick Paralysis

2-17: All In - Erdheim-Chester

2-18: Sleeping Dogs Lie - Bubonic Plague

2-19: House vs. God - Herpes Encephalitis

2-20 & 2-21: Euphoria - Naegleria

2-22: Forever - Celiac Disease

2-23: Who's Your Daddy? - Zygomycosis Fungus

2-24: No Reason - Inconclusive ... but that's OK. It was all a hallucination anyway!

Quick Movie Quiz

Which of the following scenarios is the most fantastical:

(a) Kate Beckinsale as a Vampire Warrior

(b) Kate Beckinsale as a Vampire Hunter

(c) Kate Beckinsale as Adam Sandler's wife

Instant Dietary Karma

Well, three days into my new diet and the library holds a BIG party to commemorate our being open for six months. Here is what I ate:

Mozzarella cubes
Slices of red pepper, zucchini and broccoli
Three chicken tenders

Here is just some of what I avoided:

Assorted crackers
Spinach dip
Cheese dip
French Onion dip
Club sandwiches
Cheddar Cheese Chex Mix (which is what I brought. That stings.)
Tortilla chips
Potato chips
Cupcakes
Sponge cake
Brownies (with and without nuts)
Several kinds of cheesecake
And a HUGE strawberry and vanilla cake topped with chocolate-covered strawberries about the size of friggin tennis balls.

I snagged one of the tennis balls, but I'm bringing it home for Mrs. Mosley. For all this, Fate should have me trip over Black Adder DVD set in the middle of the street tomorrow!

Forest Whitaker Quote of the Month: June 2006

Article 99 is a comedy/drama about a VA hospital that owes a lot to both Catch 22 and MASH. The most remarkable thing about it is the great ensemble they got together for this film. Look! There's the great John C. McGinley doing his "oddball doctor" routine nearly a decade before he hit it big with Scrubs! And there's Lea Thompson just before she did Caroline in the City and then dropped off the face of the earth! And Jeffrey Tambor! And John Mahoney! And ... well, you get the idea.

Also in the house is Keith David, our "Quote of the Month" subject for last year, and boy does he get some juicy dialogue to spout. It's a damn shame I hadn't seen this one earlier. It could have taken the slot that Agent Cody Banks (ugh) did.

Ah, but the Year of Keith has passed and the Year of Forest is in its stead. Here, Whitaker plays Dr. Handleman, one of the renegade doctors that bends the rules so that the Veterans in the hospital get the operations they really need. In an early scene, his colleague Dr. Sturgess (Ray Liota) spells out to an intern why they are doing a different procedure on a patient than what they are scheduled to receive. He then asks Forest's character to summarize this, and he does so with a succinct six-word answer:

Dr. Richard Sturgess - "Here's the problem. This patient needs open heart surgery. The administration of this hospital will only authorize a prostate procedure. Now what good is fixing his prostate if he has a heart attack every time he tries to use it? Right? Tell him, Sid. Tell him the rule."

Dr. Sid Handleman - "First the ventricles, then the testicles."