Hot On the Other Trail. Jack's running down a hill, Kate on his heels asking him to slow down. "I think they went this way, but I'm not as good at this as Locke is." "Where'd you pick up the tracking skills?" Jack asks disingenuously. "Was that before or after you were on the run?" "I'm trying to help, Jack," an exasperated Kate replies. "You know what might help?" Jack says. " A little honesty." Actually, Jack, Kate's honesty has no bearing on whether you are able to find Claire and Charlie, so maybe this heart-to-heart should wait for later. Nevertheless, as they trudge through the jungle, Kate tells him that her dad was in the Army and would take her on tracking trips through the Washington state forest: "Being in the woods was like his religion." Jack's dad had a religion, too! Well, not a religion so much as an addiction. He was like a chocoholic, but for booze! Speaking of which…

FlashJack! Our Lady of Vodka and Tonic Hospital. Jack enters his father's office and his dad offers him a stiff...greeting. His dad places a form and pen in front of Jack and motions for him to sign, saying the form contains "the truth" -- the line he wants Jack to stick to, that he and Jack did nothing wrong during the botched surgery. Jack responds with the kind of snippy passive-aggressiveness one might expect out of a six-year-old. Sorry, a ten-year-old. Jack's dad tries a number of ways to get Jack to sign the form and help him slide by on the whole drunk-surgery dealy: veiled threats, appeals to logic, flattery, and playing the family card. "I know I have been hard on you, but that is how you make a soft metal into steel," he says. "That is why you are the most gifted young surgeon in this city." A city that, from the view out the window, looks to be Honolulu, by the way, but probably is supposed to be Chicago or something. All TV hospitals are in Chicago. He finally wins Jack over with some bald-faced flattery, combined with a promise not to spill his margarita in a patient ever again. Jack signs the form and looks none too pleased about it.

Commercials. I'm writing this recap on a Friday afternoon, and boy am I sleepy. (The fact that it's pitch black outside at 4:00 in the damn afternoon doesn't help.) In the middle of the last graph I kinda dozed off and woke up to find I'd typed "that he and aJAck id noting ewong f erwfwefn." That's how totally exciting this episode is!