M*A*S*H (MASH) s05e19 Episode Script

Did I ever tell you you look cute with your shirt off? No.
I think I know why.
Now you made me lose count.
I gotta start all over again.
- Sleep! I wanna sleep! - Hoo-ha.
- Will you hold it down? This is very distracting.
- Mail call, sirs.
Keep away from him.
He'll start all over again.
Captain B.
J.
Hunnicutt.
Something in a plain, brown envelope.
- [Chuckles.]
- They oughta disguise those things more.
- It's the Surgical Journal, Radar.
- Oh, yeah? I seen one of those once.
I'd rather look at the outsides of people.
Hey, Hawkeye.
You got your newspaper from home.
- Get away from me with that.
- That's the Crabapple Cove Courier.
You love that.
I used to love it.
Same stupid news week after week.
Where's this month's Journal from the Institute for Applied Nudism? Wanna read Major Burns's issue of Popular Mechanics? Sometimes the ads go pretty far.
Radar, a picture of a three-way toilet valve does not go pretty far.
I just deliver 'em.
I don't make 'em up.
Look at this: "How to provide a gastric reservoir in a total resection of the stomach.
" Look, if you can't read without moving your lips, at least turn the sound off.
- What's eating you? - My back is eating me.
- Still? - I have a hungry back.
- You want a massage? - Not unless you put your shirt on.
- How about if I x-ray your back later? - I did already.
- There's nothing there.
- Nothing? No spine, nothing? The pain goes clear through to my lung.
- I thought maybe I had a spot.
- Or a Fido or a Rover.
- Oh, you're really cute.
- [Chuckles.]
If I die from this, will you read the joke at my grave? You know, I'd really dig that.
[Chuckles.]
Criminy! I'd rather read the stupid newspaper.
I'm gonna tell you right now what's gonna be in there.
Another article about incredibly average Vernon Parsons.
- Who's that? - Some dunce I went through med school with.
Every week, he's in the newspaper.
He's being put in charge of this.
- He's being promoted to that.
- So what? He's incredibly average.
The only reason he gets all this stuff is he's back there with no competition.
He's sitting back there, resting on his fallen arches.
I'm over here dancing with rats.
You'll live probably.
Listen to this "Transposition of the ileum in ascending colon.
" - What an idiot that guy was.
- By the same guy who advocated total gastrectomy in '49.
- I read that.
Fascinating.
- Vernon must have his own press agent.
I can't pick up my hometown newspaper without reading his name.
Damn it! There he is again! "Dr.
Vernon Parsons has been awarded a hundred thousand dollar grant at Boston Hospital for a two-year study of infectious disease in mice.
" They oughta give him the disease and split the dough with the mice.
Don't they realize how incredibly average this man is? I'm going to breakfast.
[Groans Loudly.]
- Worse, huh? - Do you see a knife handle sticking out of my back? - Look, I hate to give advice.
- Good.
- You never exercise.
- I wrestle periodically with the nurses.
If you'd just do something physical once in a while, you'd feel better.
You're right.
I feel a lot better.
Father, you feeling a bit under the weather today? - I have been dragging a bit.
- Not eating, I see.
- Food seems to have lost its allure.
- Can I eat your sausage, Father? - By all means, Radar.
- They're really good today.
Extra grease.
If you'll pardon the indelicacy, Father, and with all due respect to your collar, why don't you stop by the dispensary and get a good flushing out? - [Grunts.]
- We got here too late for the hard-boiled eggs.
All they have is scrambled socks.
You should've been in the army before they taught chickens to lay powdered eggs.
World War One, I ate turnips for breakfast every day for a month.
- My tongue smelled like Arthur Murray's footbath.
- You feeling all right, Father? - Why do you ask? - You keep pulling at your fingers.
- They too close to your hands? - I seem to be a little arthritic this morning.
- Off his feed too.
- You gonna finish your coffee, Father? No, no.
Go right ahead, Radar.
Let me see your eyes, Father.
What do you think, Colonel? How's his sclera? Slightly icteric.
Let's see underneath your tongue, Father.
- That tongue's as yellow as the streak down my back.
- Don't touch that coffee, Radar.
- Why? - The "Swiss Family Hepatitis" is swimming around in there.
Oh! Gee! Ooh, ick! I ate his sausage.
- Well, I didn't touch them.
- I know, Father.
But it was yours.
I mean, no offense, but, wow ooh, ick! Let's nip this in the bud.
I don't want to live through another outbreak of camp jaundice.
B.
J.
, give Father Mulcahy a blood test.
Hawkeye, examine the staff.
Give 'em a shot of gamma globulin.
Radar, check the latrine area.
See if the water supply's polluted.
I'll talk to the cook.
- Let's get busy.
- [B.
J.
.]
Come on, Father.
It was just laying out there in the open.
I wasn't going through your private papers.
- Relax, Frank.
I just wanna see your body.
- Don't be such a rude rodney.
- Frank, there's hepatitis going around.
- Hepatitis? - Yeah.
Let me see your eyes.
- Are they yellow? - How's my liver? Is it tender? - How should I know? It's your liver.
Well, feel it.
- How does that feel? - [Giggles.]
Tickles.
- Frank, try to control yourself.
- Something's wrong with me.
- Yeah? Ever since Margaret got engaged? - No! Since I've been getting shortness of breath and heart palpitations.
- Feel my chest.
- Not tonight, darling.
I have a headache.
I have a lump here under the sternum, and that's not supposed to be there.
- Is it? - Frank, go like this.
Feels like a marble.
Not like an aggie, more like an immie.
Look, I haven't got time to feel in your chest for marbles.
Let me get some blood.
I'll give you a shot in the behind, and I'll get out of here.
[Whimpers.]
Look, while you're here? - Mm-hmm? - Will you check my arms? I think my arms are getting longer.
Take two bananas and call me in the morning.
- Feel under my armpit.
- Not for five bucks.
I've got swollen nodes, and they're getting bigger and bigger.
- You know, I saw that in a movie once? - Oh, yeah? Yeah.
This guy's nodes got so big, eventually they took over Minneapolis.
And you call yourself a doctor.
Frank, will you for cripe's sake drop your driveling your hypochondria and your pants in that order.
You're not such hot stuff.
I just read about someone from your hometown.
He got a hundred thousand dollar grant from Boston Hospital for playing with mice.
Don't taunt me, Frank.
I'm holding a sharp object.
A hundred thousand smackers.
That's probably a thousand bucks a mouse.
Ow! Ouch, that hurts! Take it out! It hurts! Take it out! - I already took it out, Frank.
- Feels like you left a rock in there.
Maybe one slipped down from your head.
You broke off a needle in me, didn't ya? These few, lovely moments with you have contributed more to the pain in my back then my army cot, and that's going some.
If you care anything about human life, you'll feel my lumps before you go.
Leave 'em under my pillow.
I'll give 'em a squeeze before I go to sleep.
- [Knocking.]
- Come in.
- I have to have a look at your body, Margaret.
- Ha-ha, don't you wish.
- Lie down in the bed and let me feel your liver.
- That'll be the day.
- Get out of here.
- Margaret, we may be facing a hepatitis epidemic.
- I have to examine you.
You're gonna get a shot too.
- So are you, kiddo.
Let's start small.
Show me your eyes.
- Outside.
This bulb is too yellow.
- You're serious, aren't you? Believe me.
I wouldn't be walking around poking people's livers if I didn't have to.
- All right.
Show me under your tongue.
- No.
That's out.
- What? - I will not show you my tongue.
Especially not underneath.
- How 'bout if I show you mine first? - I can look at my own tongue.
- It's okay.
- Okay? It's gorgeous.
- I knew it.
- I have to have some blood.
Let me have a vein.
[Sighs Loudly.]
Here.
Hurry up.
Well, you're certainly braver about this than my last patient.
- Who was that? - Frank.
- [Scoffs.]
- He's afraid his body's being attacked.
He has very little to worry about.
How's your fiance Lieutenant Colonel Donald Penobscott of West Point? Fine.
He's doing very well.
Well, that certainly sounds extremely satisfactory.
- Can I confide in you? - Sure.
I've been getting some very strange letters from Donald's mother.
- Like what? - Like she's welcoming me into the family.
Well, listen.
You're not all that bad.
She's welcoming me, but in a very left-handed way.
Listen to this.
"Dear Margaret, What a pleasure it will be to include a Houlihan in our clan.
"I've only known two Houlihans before, and they were both charming.
"One was a chauffeur, who we liked very much "although we had to let him go because he drank.
"And the other was a young girl who worked for us as a maid.
We still send her Christmas cards every year at the state hospital.
" If this woman wants to start a fan club for you, tell her to forget it.
She has me sick.
I don't know what she's telling Donald.
What difference does it make? He loves you.
He's not in love with the chauffeur.
Ready? - Come on, Margaret.
You're taking all the fun out of it.
- Yes, that's right.
I am.
Margaret, this is not merely a dream come true.
- Gamma globulin goes better in a person's caboose.
- Not this person's.
- Margaret, you're a nurse.
- Oh, all right.
Let's get it over with.
My sentiments exactly.
Let us not dawdle over a moment like this.
Let us treat it as a professional encounter of the most Oh, Margaret, may I pause on this occasion to express a few thoughts? - If you say one word - Oh, I wouldn't, I wouldn't.
Not a word.
But-But if I did, that word would be "magnificent.
" Would that be bad? - Will you please give me the shot? - Okay.
Okay.
There.
How dare you come in here on the pretext of giving me a shot and then stand there ogling me as though I were a sideshow attraction.
Boy, I show you a little appreciation, and you hit the roof.
- What do you want from me? - Respect.
Simple respect.
I expect nothing more, and I'll accept nothing less.
Hey, that's pretty good.
You got me with that.
- Good.
- I mean, you really did.
I bet that would work with Donald's mother.
- What? - Maybe not those words, but that attitude.
- Simple respect.
- Maybe.
You know, in some ways, you really are magnificent.
- And not just on the outside.
- Thank you.
- You wanna give me a shot? - Buzz off! Just asking.
[Man On P.
A.
.]
Attention all personnel.
Incoming.
Incoming.
Welcoming committee to the helipad.
There will be a slight lull in our lull.
Welcoming committee to the helipad.
There will be a slight lull in our lull.
I don't know what we're gonna do with this boy over here.
- Oh, God.
- I sent for Hawkeye.
- I think we need another opinion.
- How'd this happen? He's a tank driver.
When a shell gets inside one of those tubs it just ricochets around, chews up everything in its path.
- Where do you start? - I'm here.
What's the matter with you? You're all bent over.
- Who told you? - You're turning into a question mark.
And the question is how I got this way.
Pretty bad, huh? Among other things, he has no stomach to speak of.
- I know they could deal with this down in Seoul.
- But the trip might kill him.
And if one of us tried it up here, we might kill him.
- What do you think? - You're the chief surgeon.
You tell me.
He'll need a partial gastrectomy, maybe even a total.
I think B.
J.
oughta do it.
He's the closest we come to an expert on this.
Expert? I've never done this before.
I've only read about it.
Well, that puts you one up on the rest of us.
Work from the book.
- Suppose I make a mistake? - Suppose we send him down to Seoul on the buckboard express? - He'll be off your conscience, but he won't be any more alive.
- It's a tough choice.
Fine.
Take your time.
What are you gonna do? All right.
I'll do it.
Look at this.
I'm sweating already.
Go scrub.
Carmine, prep him.
Pierce, see me in my office later about your back.
Why? Is something wrong with my back? [Hawkeye Groans.]
[Mumbling.]
"In the colon, transected" - What the hell are you doing? - I wanna see if you got hepatitis - before you put your hands in that guy.
- I gave myself a blood test.
- Leave me alone, will ya? - Mind if I give you a shot while you're scrubbing up? I'm trying to read.
Will you get out of here? Look, I gotta jab 15 people before I go to sleep tonight.
- Otherwise this entire staff will be flat on its livers.
- See me after the operation.
I'll be waiting at the stage door with a flower in my buttonhole.
- The Swamp, 10:00.
- Good luck, Beej.
Let's see, "The terminal ileum is divided five inches proximal to the ileocecal valve.
" God.
Let's jump to the end and see how this operation turns out.
- How you feeling, Father? - Uh, fine actually.
- Well, weak, really.
- I brought you some juice.
- Oh, thank you.
- Your blood test showed hepatitis.
Probably infectious.
We're gonna have to isolate you for a week or so.
You mean I can't see people? How will I hear confessions tomorrow night? Well, maybe they can write their sins on pieces of paper and slip them under the door.
- Possibly.
- Then we can auction off the pieces of paper and make a fortune for the orphanage.
How am I going to administer the sacraments? How can I give Holy Communion? I can't place the Eucharist on their tongues.
- I'll infect them all.
- You're gonna have to take a rain check for a while.
What if somebody needs last rites in the O.
R.
? People are depending on me.
I really don't feel all that bad, you know.
- You wanna kill yourself? - Well, at least let's rig up something so I can hear confessions through a flap in the tent.
- Father, you have to rest a little.
- No, no, no, no.
Look here.
You don't understand.
Their souls are in my charge.
- Father, you're sick.
- Well, so are you.
Look at your back.
That's not stopping you from doing your work.
All right.
I'll work out a light confession schedule for you.
Maybe people can cut down on their sinning and give you a break.
- I'm hearing confessions, and that's it.
- All right.
Get a little rest.
Nobody's pushing me around.
Good afternoon, Klinger.
I'm checking for hepatitis.
- Drop your pants and show me your eyes.
- Forget it, sir.
The last time I dropped my pants, they put me in the army.
The next time I drop 'em, it's to stick 'em out the porthole and wave bye-bye.
- How are your eyes? - Bloodshot from pounding potatoes.
Come on, Klinger.
I want to get home and slip into some comfortable traction.
Here.
They look like potato eyes, right? You are what you mash.
- Show me your tongue.
- Gladly.
- Let me see the underside.
- Wait, I'll stand on my head.
What are you so cranky about? Because I drew K.
P.
30 straight days for punching out Zale.
I should get a medal for that.
We're supposed to fight the enemy, aren't we? You're fighting Zale again? What about? Aw, it's stupid.
He insulted the Toledo Mud Hens.
I take it that's a baseball team and not yesterday's lunch.
The trouble is I got a short fuse.
My wife, Laverne, keeps writing me, "When you get angry, count to 10 and ask St.
Anthony for help.
" I go one, two, three pow! Once I got to eight.
I never needed any help from St.
Anthony.
- I'm too hot-blooded.
- Let me draw a little of that hot blood from your vein.
- I really gotta work on it.
- Yeah, right.
- I can't stand myself when I lose my temper.
- Hold still, will ya? Sure.
So he insults the Mud Hens.
What does he know? I should get excited over an ignorant remark from a stupid idiot like him? - Hold it, will ya? Talk with the other hand.
- Sure.
I'm not wasting my time on him.
That dumb jerk! - Excuse me.
- You want me to stab myself? Just hold still.
- Right.
- All right? He's always making cracks about my lingerie.
He just doesn't have the guts.
I'd like to see him in a panty girdle! Sorry.
I didn't mean to raise my voice.
Can I have a little cooperation? The pain in my back is beginning to grow roots.
I gotta calm down.
I don't care what he says about me.
But he mentions the Mud Hens again, he's getting it right in the puss! - Will you watch it? - I'm sorry.
Did I hurt ya? Fortunately, I'm in a permanent duck.
Look, during a physical examination, I'm supposed to get physical, not you.
- Now get over there.
- Sir.
- Give me that.
- Here, take it.
- Sir? - Uh-huh? If you find out I got hepatitis, I'm gonna kiss Zale right on the mouth.
I'm very happy for you.
"The ileocolic segment is turned upward and the end of the ileum anastomosed to the end of the esophagus" blues.
Everything under control? You know what this reminds me of? Assembling those toys I got as a kid.
Fold Flap "A" into Slot "B.
" I could never tell my flap from my slot.
- You can't find that kid's Flap "A," don't guess.
- I'm all right.
It's amazing how much you can tell from a few drops of blood though, isn't it? - Yep.
- You could tell everything from a guy's blood, can't you? Everything that's fit to print.
- It's really sort of fascinating, isn't it? - I'm all a-tingle myself.
- What are you worried about, Radar? - Oh, nothing, uh.
Well, I mean, it was just that I was wondering if if you could tell if a guy has any, you know, special problems.
Like, uh, like he's anemic or, uh, he isn't red-blooded enough or - What's the matter? - Well, I'll tell ya.
Um, sometimes I go out with the guys.
You know, like to Rosie's Bar? We really have a good time.
We're always, uh, singing and laughing and telling what we're gonna do after the war.
Then a couple of guys will start joking with some of the business girls.
And before I know it, I start to feel different.
- Different? - I get sleepy.
And you're afraid there's something wrong with you? No.
Is there? Yeah.
You're suffering from a severe case of decency.
I mean, I really wish I could have a good time like they do, you know? I mean, just bust out and drink and tell lies to strange girls and come back to camp the next morning without any sleep and throw up all day.
I really wish I could at least just once.
Look, everybody's different, Radar.
You're here with a bunch of guys you'll probably never see again.
You don't have to try to be like them.
You know, most people act crazy when they're out of town.
- Hmm.
- But you're different.
You always take a little bit of Iowa with you wherever you go.
That's nice.
Don't try to change that.
Someday you'll meet somebody that you'd like to introduce to your mom.
And instead of taking advantage of her you'll offer her a gift you've been working on all your life.
Yourself.
And believe me, you won't get sleepy.
- You know what I mean? - Yeah.
[Sniffles.]
Thanks.
I hate to say this at this point, but would you drop your pants? Now, the first time they did this operation they came up with an ileocolic segment that was gangrenous.
This guy doesn't even have that end of his ileum, so I guess we can forget that.
Did you do a splenectomy, or did the shell fragment do it for you? I did some.
The North Koreans did the rest.
My God, don't they know this poor guy's still got a few payments left on his house? I guess his neighbors down at the draft board didn't mention that in his letter of reference.
- Cut.
- It looks to me like you oughta bejust about done.
One more stitch, I'll be ready to start closing.
How's he doing? Stable, Doctor.
I think he's going to make it.
[Chuckles.]
Cut.
There.
[Exhales.]
I just knitted a soldier.
- ##[Big Band.]
- I was supposed to give you a shot in the Swamp at 10:00.
- What are you doing here? - Hawkeye, Hawkeye, Hawkeye, Hawkeye, Hawkeye! I did it! I saved him.
He's alive! - Louis Pasteur couldn't have put it better.
- I'm a life-giver.
Congratulations.
Really, I mean it.
Show me your tongue.
My tongue? That's small potatoes.
I'll show you my butt! Hey! Hey, everybody.
All right, all right, all right.
All right.
- Give me your attention.
- A simple "Ah" would be sufficient.
In celebration of the world's most difficult surgery and the world's most wonderful surgeon snatching life out of the jaws of death we unveil for you now, the Hippocrates of Ouijongbu.
[Whistling, Cheering.]
## [Singing.]
- ## [Continues.]
- Dip, Baker, dip! ## [Ends.]
[Cheering.]
- Uh-huh.
- There's no contamination of the water supply.
The patient we had here three weeks ago showed up in Seoul with a severe case of infectious hepatitis.
Let's hope Father Mulcahy caught it from him, and this will be the end of it.
[Exhales.]
I'm for that.
- Okay.
Now, what's with you? - What's with me? You been walking around like Lon Chaney's stand-in.
At first I thought it was pleurisy.
Then I thought maybe a disc.
- I don't know what it is.
- I hear you've been reading your hometown newspaper.
You think they're poisoning the ink? I think maybe you haven't made up your mind how you feel about being over here, feeding the fleas.
As far as I'm concerned, the fleas can eat out at the Chinese restaurant down the street.
How do you feel about spending the war over here, even though you're not incredibly average.
- I guess I'm angry.
- How do you feel about being angry? [Sighs.]
You think I'm mad, and I won't admit it, huh? I think you're gonna come out of this war with a merit badge for tying yourself up in knots.
Here, take a belt of that.
Can I tell you something as a friend? A tough friend? Tough friends last longer.
When I was an enlisted man, I was short.
Not like I am now.
For a while there, I thought I'd look taller if I could knock a few of the big guys flat on their backs.
Then it dawned on me.
I was just fighting myself and using their ribs to hurt my hands on.
Fig Newtons and Scotch.
Listen, it's too big a world to be in competition with everybody else.
The only guy I have to get better than is who I am right now.
And in your case, that's tough enough.
They're great if you dunk 'em.
So what do I do about incredibly average Vernon Parsons? Relax.
Let him have his little research grant.
Live and let live.
And then just to give yourself a little present, send him an anonymous letter.
That's not a bad idea.
I could tell him I saw him cheating on an exam once.
Tell him you're filing a malpractice suit.
- I'm beginning to feel better.
- Tell him you're filing a paternity suit.
[Laughing.]
Doctor, Doctor, I can walk.
- Hey, B.
J! - Quiet.
Quiet.
- You know what your trouble is? - Yes, I'm dying.
- That's not your trouble.
- Right.
My trouble is I'm not dying fast enough.
- You don't get enough exercise.
- Uh-huh.
The cure for a hangover is to get the blood out of your keister and into your brain.
- Watch this.
- What? Hey, Hawkeye, come on.
Don't do that.
That's dangerous.
Are you kidding? I'm in perfect control.
Come on.
Don't fool around, Hawkeye.
- Ow! My head.
- [Hawkeye.]
My back! - My head! - [Hawkeye.]
My back!