I'm just going to tell you now that for the rest of the episode, we're going to be starting out each act with Tyra/Connor scenes. It's almost as if they realize this whole subplot is completely extraneous and they want to get these scenes out of the way as quick as possible. Or at least give you a little more time to come back from your commercial-break bathroom trips. So here we are. It looks like Connor ended up going out into the oil fields by himself, because he's out there meeting with a couple of hard-hatted, coveralled guys, using the open tailgate of a pickup as a conference table. I can't really hear them talking, but the closed captioning of Connor's speech informs us that Dillon is a relatively oil-poor county surrounded by areas with much richer deposits. It figures that 65 million years ago, even the dinosaurs didn't want to live there. Tyra apparently started feeling bad about blowing Connor off earlier, because her car pulls up and she gets out with a bag of fast-food dinner. "One Scotch, One Bourbon, One Beer" by Blind Willie Johnson is coming out of her car speakers. I hope she also feels bad about making fun of his hat, now that she knows he was blind.

Later, she's chatting up Connor next to her car and sharing more of her worldview about the locals "caught up in their tiny little lives." Of course, the shot is framed so that both figures look completely wee under the gigundous Texas sky. Tyra also shares her unsolicited opinion of oil in general, which she hates. "I know it's a widely-held belief, but any particular reason?" he asks. She blames it for her father's downfall, and that of the whole town. "It's worse than crack. The big dealers come in promising the good times will last forever, and just as fast, it's gone. And all the money's gone with it." Connor confesses that oil isn't his favorite thing either, and that he even drives a hybrid back home. Tyra asks if he likes it in Los Angeles (translation: "Take me with you!"). He says he does, and that she'd do well there (translation: "Let's start practicing for your porn film auditions!"). Tyra asks how long he's going to be in town, and he thinks another week at least. And after that gaping opening she just left him, what else can he do but ask her out to dinner tomorrow night? She gives an almost convincing show of considering it, then accepts. I hope he doesn't plan to take her to Applebee's.

Jason's doing an upper-body workout alone in his room, rolling his wheelchair laboriously back and forth along the narrow lane between his and Herc's beds. He notices a photo of Herc, looking victorious in a track outfit in his more bipedal days. Herc himself comes in and compliments Jason's progress, giving a rueful chuckle when Jason asks him how long ago the picture was taken. "A while back," he non-answers. Which is good, because it looks like the prop department snapped it and had it framed that very morning when the actor playing Herc showed up for call. Jason asks Herc what his injury was, and is told, "Same as you. C7-T1. We got our fingers. We're the lucky ones around here." Jason doesn't feel so lucky right now, but Herc isn't in the mood for any more inspirational smackdowns, now that they're buddies and all. "It's all relative, QB," he says gently, and starts to head out again. So he just stopped into his room to... look at Jason? Okay. Before he goes, Jason asks Herc how long it took him to start playing quad rugby. Herc turns back and tells him it was about a year, including six months "drowning in a sea of self-pity." Jason quietly latches onto that six-month figure. Which is handy, because that should fall right around the season finale. Jason thinks about this possible new lease on life, how he can still be an athlete, how he has a future after all. Something to look forward to. Maybe things aren't so bad.