McDreamy catches up with Mere as they walk through the halls, and she asks if he's okay. McDreamy pulls a longer face than John Kerry's and says he's fine, it's just the holidays. Mere gets all sad, too, and says she does know, and follows him into the hospital room.

First patient: Tim Epstein, 38, fell off the roof of his house stringing "Hanumas" lights. The room is filled with Tim's children, who are climbing all over Tim and festooning him with toy dinosaurs and the like. Tim is very good-natured about all this action, and tells the Gang that the good news is, his head broke his fall. Mere reports that there are no visible deformities, but Tim is having some focal left-arm weakness, and his head hurts when he laughs. One of Tim's kids bounces a toy off McDreamy's face, which makes everyone laugh. Another one announces to Bailey that he knows karate; Bailey looks a little scared, and says Tim might need some quiet time. Tim says they're fine, all five hundred of them, and he doesn't want to miss out on the holidays with them. McDreamy orders Izzie to take him down for a CT, so I guess he's getting some peace whether he likes it or not.

The next patient they visit is Nadia Shelton, 41, who is in for excision of a gastric ulcer. Nadia's family is also all there, and they are loud and annoying. The Gang is accompanied by Webber, who apologizes to Nadia for the inconvenience: her surgery has been rescheduled for three days now. Nadia's overbearing mother gripes about having to watch her child sit there in pain for three days, and some other relative joins in. I can already tell that this family's scenes are going to be the ones I "accidentally" skip over. Webber explains that they have a lot of trauma cases at the holidays, all of which have been more urgent than Nadia's ulcer. Nadia's husband says, "Are you saying my wife's not important? Is that what he's saying?" The rest of the family starts yelling all at once, while Bailey and Webber try to calm them down. It doesn't work. I want to kill myself. Webber finally gives in: "ALL RIGHT! Dr. O'Malley, prep [Nadia]! Her surgery will happen this morning." The family all cheer, while Nadia kind of cringes with embarrassment.

Bailey tells Alex to cover the pit: all the holiday idiocy he can expect there is her gift to him. Heh. She's about to assign Cristina and Mere when Burke runs over and tells her they've found a donor for a heart transplant patient of his. Cristina gets it, and Mere and Alex walk off bitching about it. Alex tells her that, to top it all off, he retakes his boards tomorrow, and is pretty sure he's going to fail. "Makes today my last day here, and I get to spend it doing stitches in the pit." Aw.