How I Met Your Mother Recap: Stuff

Title: “Stuff”
Original Airdate: February 19, 2007
GMMR Recapper: Jim Mosby

As we get older we tend to accumulate more and more stuff. Some of it we buy, some of it our family buys for us out of need, some things are gifts, some things are gifts from…our ex’s. The age old question is: Do we get rid of the things that our ex’s gave us, or do you keep it? As well, do you expect your current significant other to get rid of their stuff? Hmm. Come to think of it, we acquire more and more ex’s as well. How do you handle that?

This week’s episode took a look at that very issue, as well as another crucial issue, how do you handle your friends’ hobbies, well, when the suck. This was a great episode, and, the continuity of it all had me on the floor laughing.

Everything started out with Ted completely putting his foot in his mouth as he retells several stories that he thinks involve Robin but actually involve his “sister.” I mean, ex-girlfriends. For some reason, Ted just cannot bring himself to mention any ex’s to Robin and always inserts “Sister” in place of any of his ex’s in any relevant story. Robin isn’t exactly falling for it though and the both of them agree, they need to be honest about their past dating history. Well, maybe not too honest. Hint: Guys (and girls) to avoid jealousy, don’t point out to your sig other someone else that you once made out with! Bad idea.

Let’s step aside from the ex drama for a minute to see the start of this week’s other plot line. Lily, the aspiring thespian. Barney and Marshall are sitting at their normal table down in McClaren’s arguing over who they would rather do. A normal mermaid. Woman on top, fish on bottom, or a reverse mermaid, fish on top, woman on bottom. Weird. In runs Lily with a flier for the play that she’s performing in. Barney is not amused. Every so often Swarley Barney comes up with a nugget of incontrovertible truth, and, here he speaks, and is so so right:

Barney: Ohhh, Lily, I’d love to but we’re not in college and I’m not trying to sleep with you.
Marshall: Hey, Lily’s friend asked her to be in this play and it’s going to be really good.
Barney: Lily, I love you, but you are too old for this. Asking someone to come see your play is like asking someone for a ride to the airport or to crash on your couch, or to help you move. Call a cab, book a room, hire some movers. Repeat after me friends don’t let friends come and see their crappy play.

Just as Barney finishes dispensing with those words of wisdom, in walks Ted and Robin looking to the group for a ruling on whether or not the ex’s stuff is an issue or not. Let’s rewind a few minutes and see what started the dispute. Just like they did with the landmark case, Lily vs. the Joey Buttafuco Pants. (Nobody can deny, Marshall’s fashion sense is awful! At least the gang was nice enough to tell him absolutely not, you must get rid of them.)

Robin was complaining that her face was dry and needed some moisturizer, and Ted was so kind as to oblige with some that he had in their bathroom.

(Lesson: Lily HATES the word “moist” – it made me crack up laughing, I have a friend who has the same aversion and same cringing reaction to that word and I love using it. And well, *ahem* apparently a someone else around the givememyremote.com world has problem with that word too, so, Lily is not alone)

So, apparently Ted thought the moisturizer was Robin’s, she thought it was his, maybe it was Lily’s, but, yea, that’s right, it was that of an ex-girlfriend of Mr. Mosby.

Robin: Who’s moisturizer is this?
Ted: My sister’s?
Robin: So in other words, some girl you went out with.
Ted: Umm. I love you.
Robin: Disgusting. You let me put on the same moisturizer as one of your ex’s. Why is that still in your apartment?
Ted: I don’t know. I just never threw it out.
Robin: Well, why not? Do you still have feelings for this girl?
Ted: Yea, I’m madly in love with her. The only way I can deal with it is by holding on to a $3 tube of lotion.
Robin: Yea, $3. Try $14!
Ted: Why is this such a big deal?
Robin: Because I don’t want to use some whore’s moisturizer.
Ted: She is not a whore.
Robin: Well, she is leaving expensive moisturizers lying all over town; she sounds like a whore to me.

Wow. We have a problem, as the argument continued; we discover that Ted has multiple items around the house still that were gifts from previous girlfriends. Including the sweatshirt that poor Robin had on at that very moment.

Ted argues to the group that instead of the particular girlfriend that gave him the stuff, he sees the good times associated around the time he got the stuff. Like the good times he had in college, or how poor he used to be. Robin argued that she is only going to see Ted’s ex’s in the stuff. The group ruled in Robin’s favor, Ted has to get rid of the stuff. He packed up all of the stuff.

Back to our other plotline, Lily’s play. The gang hiked up 8 flights of stairs to get to the ‘theater’ and prepared themselves for the play. It was awful, it wasn’t a Broadway play, nor Off-Broadway, not Off-Off Broadway, it was a level below the crazy people screaming in the park. And somehow poor Ted ended up a part of the three hour monstrosity thanks to Lily using him. Whereas the rest of the group was falsely complimentary of dearest Lilypad, Barney, ehh, not so much. (Only Barney can make an insult sound like a compliment with the tone of his voice)

Barney: Wow, Lily that sucked!
Marshall: Barney!
Barney: What, it was terrible. Hey, I’m sorry, I was just being honest, because we’re friends.
Lily: No, friends make each other feel good, they give each other a pat on the back, they build them up and support them.
Barney: Yea, if you are a smurf.

Lily told Barney that she would support him and compliment him on a play even if it was awful just because that is what friends do. I think Lily threw out the gauntlet to Barney. In one of my two favorite scenes of this ep, when the director of the play offers up a Q&A session afterwards, Barney sprinted out, jumping over chairs to break free before he was trapped.

As Robin and Ted return to the apartment, they were saying just how insensitive Barney was, yet, well, agreeing with him. It was horrible. On the bright side, when they got back, Robin saw that Ted removed everything and the apartment looked oh so bare.

The next day the problems between our favorite couple started.

Ted: At first I was really bummed about getting rid of all of my stuff but seeing how happy it makes – totally worth it.
Robin: Awww, kind of like how I feel when I begrudgingly have sex with you when I am really tired.
Ted: Exactly, sometimes you’ve gotta take one for the team. You mean you don’t keep anything your ex boyfriends gave you?
Robin: Nope, well, except for my dogs.

Ouch. Here we go, not good. Each and every one of Robin’s 5 dogs were a gift from a previous paramour. Ted can’t stand it. He had to get rid of everything from his past relationships while Robin kept the dogs. He can see her previous boyfriends in each of the dogs now. (Such a great scene as Robin tells the dogs to do things and Ted can only see a guy on a leash doing whatever).
Again, the argument gets taken to the group, and, once again, Ted loses miserably. You can’t get rid of a dog. At first Ted is okay with her keeping the dogs, and, over time things keep getting worse and worse. He can only see her ex’s in her lap, walking with them or in bed with them. Robin thinks that maybe it’s time to send them to her Aunt’s farm in Upstate New York. They’ll be better there than in the city anyways.

Lily gave her dogs away and surprised Ted with the news at his apartment door step. They went into the apartment after Ted tried to keep her out and guess what? He put all of the stuff back in its place. Ensue fight scene. This was the worst fight that he and Robin ever had.

Future Ted: It was one of those fights that lasts for hours, you get woozy and lose track of what you are fighting about. We fought so long the seasons changed outside of the window. Pages of the calendar flew off. Crazy but ultimately, I couldn’t tell you for the life of me but somehow we got to here. (Shot of Robin and Ted sitting on the couch looking as if they are going to break up)
Robin: (looking defeated) We’re really doing this?
Ted: Yea.

But then, down at the bar, they happily announce to the rest of the gang that they are moving in together. Wow! Congrats!

Barney gave the gang fliers for his play and tells them he expects all of them there and of course, like the good friends they are, they go to his one man show entitled “Suck it Lily.” Aww, how sweet. The first 40 minutes of the play consisted entirely of Barney saying the word “moist” repeatedly and the next 20 minutes consisted of Barney shooting Lily in the face with a tiny squirt gun. At this point, most of the audience minus the gang is leaving or has already left. It’s that bad. Then it just got weird. Barney was in an awful robot costume talking about his inner feelings, and then topped off with an act with Barney playing the recorder. At this point, the audience was only Robin, Lily, Marshall and Ted. Lily could take it no more and had nothing nice to say, though, you could tell part of him was truly sad as they never got to Act II. Much to Marshall’s dismay, they stayed for the next hour and a half for the second act.

Things kept getting weirder as the Robot fell in love, its software had been hacked, and Barney was singing about how the toaster oven was the one for the robot. True love had been found. Marshall’s sanity had been lost.

In what was without a doubt the best display of continuity in this entire series’ history, Marshall snapped, jumped up on stage…and WHAP slapped Barney and declared victoriously to the remaining audience, “That’s two.” Yes folks, that was slap number two of five as permitted by the slap bet commissioner after the whole Robin Sparkles revelation.

Thank you Carter Bays and Craig Thomas for not forgetting about the Slap Bet!

Kaboom! You’ve been lawyered by Jim Mosby. Half Jim Halpert, half Ted Mosby. At least that’s how he describes himself. Maybe minus the Halpert good looks he’d be telling the truth. Jim loves feedback, and is a comment whore, so, indulge him if you can.

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