I was complaining about how the last episode of House was too simple for my taste. I paced around my college dormitory hall, sulking in “mixed” feelings about the ending. My first black friend Danny pummeled me with brags and boasts of his acceptance of the Desperate Housewives series finale, and I kept telling him to shut the hell up. I decided I’ll spend the next week or so putting off reality until next Monday shows up with no new episode of House to watch.

My hall banquet was held in Bucklebury, Middle Earth, University of California, Irvine, on May 21, 2012, from 6:00 pm to 10:00 pm. The House series finale was from 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm, with the first hour being a retrospective episode created by Hugh Laurie himself which reflected on those eight miraculous years. I finally put my foot down and stated reluctantly, “My hallmates are more important than House.” My half-black, half-Chinese friend Danny accused me of not being a true House fan. It stabbed me, of course, but in my heart I knew I was doing the right thing.

I ended up watching the last episode of House with my “I can do whatever the hell I want when I’m around him” friend Michael on his laptop. I couldn’t see the show end in any other way, and that was both a blessing and a curse. I just couldn’t get over the fact that this is it. There’s gonna be no more House EVER: they’re going to tear down the set, Hugh Laurie’s gonna find a new project, and I’ll have no TV show to call my own.

It hit me Monday night in the middle of an episode of Doctor Who with my fellow Harrowdale Whovians that I started joining them for those midnight viewing parties because of the fact that House was ending. In my mind, I was subconsciously replacing Dr. Gregory House with the Doctor because I needed another figure on which to hold forever. That would definitely explain the sudden impulse to spend $24.99 on a toy resembling the Eleventh Doctor’s sonic screwdriver.

I remember a day in my junior year of high school where I stood in front of Mr. Vasquez, our AP English Language and Composition teacher, in attempts to figure out my lacking efforts in his class. He asked me what I wanted to do after high school, and I responded with “maybe a doctor or something”. Of course he asked why, and I could only mutter, “Because I like House.” He accused me of only liking the show because of the drama and that I cannot expect anything like that in the real world of medicine. I always told everyone around me, including my family (“I’m watching so I can learn from it and become a doctor” excuse always works on Asian parents), that I was watching it for the medicine and that the drama was just a bonus to the fun, but that was in no way the whole story.

Halloween of my senior year flew by, and I decided that the best way to celebrate a holiday I’ve always disregarded as belonging to the “seculars” was to dress up as my favorite character House. My first Academic Decathlon speech opened up with the infamous line muttered by the curmudgeonly misanthrope House: “People don’t change.” I still hold that maxim true, as I cannot possibly see people change, for better or for worse. My shorter but more intellectually adept friend Sanlie accused me of using that line as an excuse I use to not move and actually take responsibility for myself, now that I’m an “adult”.

Last Thanksgiving, I caught the stomach flu for the first time, and although it was not at all an exciting experience, you would not know how overly enthusiastic I was to be prescribed my very own bottle of Vicodin. Luckily, to this day I have not taken a single pill from that canister, and I hope that the troubles of this world would not push me to my limits and cause me to drown my body in the drug. I had gone to school that Halloween with a bottle of Amoxicillin instead, and that was probably the last time I can remembering dry swallowing a pill. My grandpa had a bottle of Hydrocone in his medicine Tupperware box, and I have always been tempted to try one, just for the heck of it.

I found an old wooden cane in my house a couple years back, and when told that it belonged to no one, I immediately seized possession of it. It was brown and chipped and killed my hand when I brought it to SPOP at UCI for support of my sprained ankle, but it made me happy.

My first House gift was from my high school crush Tammy: it was the first season DVD box set. I haven’t opened it yet, and it holds not symbolic meaning for any remaining feelings I have—I intend to open it soon enough. My second House gift was from a quiet fellow Decathlete named Peter, who decided to mock my wish for a new cane with a peppermint miniature one but made up for it with a House lanyard. I sport it everywhere I go now, with my student ID and room key card attached at the very end of it. It came with a name tag holder, but the plastic’s been ripping, so I tucked it away in my Yahtzee memories box.

I’ve always looked up to House in the most ironic ways. As a Christian, God has told me to be everything House is not—compassionate, loving, and not an ass. His atheism bothered me, of course, but I tucked that detail away in a folder labeled “denial”. His rational way of thinking and his rude, crude witticism always got to me. It was because of his character that got me wanting to read the Sherlock Holmes series, but I couldn’t even get through the first book.

I’m still getting over the fact that it’s over, but here’s something I’m telling myself to keep me sane and well: “You don’t celebrate a man by his death, but by his life.” I’ll get over the series finale being too simple for my taste. I plan on re-watching the series in its entirety this summer, from pilot to finale and all the bloopers, behind-the-scenes, and commentary shoved in between it all. Thank you House cast and production, for making the past four and a half years a mind-blowing, heart-consuming, body-selling experience for me.

Critical Thinking Questions

1. What do you think the character Danny meant when he accused the author of this blog “not a true House fan”? Do you find this to be true? Explain.
2. The author of this blog has always sought for a connection between the patient of the week in each episode to relate to some situation through which the main characters were struggling. Pick one of the 176 episodes aired and evaluate the metaphors and symbols used in it.
3. Do you believe that the author of this blog can simply switch to a new favorite TV show? Take the case of his starting Doctor Who with his friends. Do you believe that he could ever replace House? Why or why not?
   

You thought taking Cosmology would be interesting, learning about dark matter, supernovae, and quantum mechanics, but now you’re regretting not taking this class for pass/no pass credit. Who knew your professor would be sweet, old lady with an IQ of 120 or 180 or something else who still functions as an active member of the American Astronomical Society? Who knew that she would have terrible handwriting, a fantastic memory, and a unsurprising sense of humor? Who knew that the class wouldn’t have a midterm or final test, but who knew, most importantly, that her homework assignments would be so demanding? Each question is practically an research paper in itself, even if the rules permit for the frequent copy-paste methodology (with proper citation, of course). The cumulative scoring system allows for lots of flexibility, and you’ve already calculated the number of assignments you need to finish and turn in to get a meager B. If you put in more effort instead of fooling around with your time, that A would have been very much possible, but of course you would throw it away. With the proper responsible attitude, you wouldn’t be here in the 24-hour study lounge typing away a second-person narrative of your current situation, sipping away at your first can of Monster and struggling to chew this Nature Valley peanut butter granola bar. You wouldn’t have resorted to ask for fishy white substances from a certain hallmate in efforts of forcing your mind and body to remain functioning for the sake of productivity and creativity. You don’t need to wait for the bookstore to open at 8 o’clock in the morning just to purchase acrylic paints and brushes to finish your artwork, but your perfectionist mind has already attached yourself to this project, and you won’t sleep a wink until it is complete. You could have simply scribbled a couple of planets and stars on a sheet of printer paper and turned that in, but of course you don’t want to resort to such desperation. You want to look good no matter what the consequences. Your father was right—this is absolutely not healthy for you.

Critical Thinking Questions

1. Why did the author of this blog choose to write this post in the second-person narrator?
2. Write a research paper on the pros and cons of consuming caffeine in order to stay awake.
3. Why would someone want to take a class with an interesting subject but a demanding workload?

Essay 5 of HumCore is due at 1:00 pm. Despite this fact, I decided to dabble once again in the psychological deception that is “The Resistance”. My history contains a terrible poker face, ambiguous seriousness, and the benefit of the doubt—in others, that is. After I think about it, you can just make your own pieces without buying the game, but the joy is somewhat produced from the reality of the pieces. The game’s a bit like Mafia, but only in the sense you don’t really know who’s who (or is it “who’s whom”?). The deception is so much more embedded, so you need players who actually want to play, like for Quelf—actually, for any party game.

Distraction continued with my fifth episode of Doctor Who, the reboot version, of course. My friends are converting me from my beloved Dr. House, I swear! When House finishes up this final season, I plan to start from the first season of the reboot Doctor Who that began in 2005 so I can finally understand what I’m watching. Either that, or I’ll try to catch up during spring break (but I doubt that’s possible with all the mind-blowing that’s ensued).

Well, I wonder if Frederick Douglass would have expected millions of students across the nation would be writing essays of various prompts regarding his Narrative. That paper won’t do itself, although that would be miraculous.

Critical Thinking Questions

1. From a biblical perspective, is it moral to lie for harmless fun? Give a personal example of a time you may have lied for such.
2. What causes someone to label a television show their favorite show? Do you have a favorite TV show? Why is it your favorite?
3. Based on the post above, how does the author of this blog craft his ethos? What rhetorical choices has he made, and why?