One of Dr. M’s favorite TV shows is a series on the House and Garden Network called House Hunters. I take pains not to deride my wife’s viewing preferences, lest she rejoin with the fact that I’ve watched the same Law and Order episode twelve times. Of course, that’s different. I’m not really re-watching the episodes, I’m re-evaluating the legal arguments, which is an entirely different thing.
Anyone buying that?
Here’s how House Hunters works. A couple is looking for a place to live, sometimes in an American city, sometimes in more exotic places, like in Costa Rica, or Rome. A local real estate agent offers them three possibilities to check out, and at the end, the “house hunters” pick one of them.
That’s the whole show.
No sarcasm intended – though a little may have trickled in on its own – House Hunters can be pretty suspenseful. Every episode is skillfully constructed so that each property provides the prospective buyers with deal-clinching or deal-breaking pluses and minuses, over which the couple “Ooooh’s” and “Aw’s” as they’re shown about the premises.
“The living room is so spacious.”
“But the deck faces a condemned neighborhood.”
“The kitchen has all the amenities.”
“But the second bedroom is kind of small. I thought it was a walk-in closet.”
“The kids are going to love this swimming pool.”
“Yes, but there’s no fence around it. They’ll drown.”
Though perhaps not scintillating, House Hunters has a way of holding your interest. (Especially considering what else in on.)
We stick around to see what they’ll finally choose: The “cookie-cutter” condo with the magnificent ocean view? Or the less expensive “fixer-upper” with unlimited “upside potential”?
“When we return, we’ll find out which home Todd and Isabel have chosen to make their own?”
Be honest, now. Who wouldn’t return for that?
Okay, so that’s the prototype.
Now here’s my version.
Recently, our cardiologist gave us the names of several surgeons, all of whom (just like the realtor and their houses) he thinks are just what we’re looking for. What happens now is that we meet with each of these surgeons, and in the end, we decide which one of them will repair my heart valve.
Do you see what I’m going for here?
It’s exactly the same show. The format is identical, except instead of houses, we’re choosing a heart surgeon. It seems perfect for the Medical Channel.
Tell me what you think of this title:
Surgeon Search
Maybe I should try a prototype right here on the blog. After every interview with a heart surgeon, I’ll give you my impressions of how things went, the pluses and the minuses. Who knows? Maybe I’ll let you vote on which surgeon I should pick. (But weighted, so that my vote counts for more. Come on. It’s my heart.)
I don’t know about you, but I’m smelling a hit here.
Whoo-hoo! I’m back in the business!
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5 comments:
You don’t realize “how back in the business” you are, Mr. P. I read somewhere that patients who go through heart valve surgery are usually back at work within 4-6 weeks. So congratulations on the career move. I’m writing Obama, this may be a solution for everyone who’s been downsized; so he needs to get a move on that health care reform.
As for Surgeon Search, I’m game, but sounds a little more like The Bachelor. Except instead of a rose, do you present the selected surgeon with a urine sample? And why stop with an homage only to contemporary programming? While you are on a roll, what about a medical spinoff of the old To Tell the Truth game show with Bud Collyer?
----Contestant #1: “I’m Dr. Murray Rosenblatt, and I just checked Earl’s prostate.”
----Contestant #2: “I’m Dr. Murray Rosenblatt, and I just checked Earl’s prostate.”
----Contestant #3: “I’m Dr. Murray Rosenblatt, and I just checked Earl’s prostate.”
Then any of the surviving rotating To Tell the Truth panelists – Betty White, Polly Bergen, Orson Bean, Phyllis Newman, etc. all grill the contestants on various aspects of the examination. The stooge with the most incorrect votes – who in this case is actually either an oil rig foreman or a plumbing inspector – gets to examine Chuck Lorre for hernia. On second thought your idea is better.
PS: With regard to the home hunt show that sparked all this, I’d like to share one of my favorite New Yorker cartoons. A fashionable New York socialite is observing a down on his luck homeless man, living on a flattened cardboard box propped up against an alley wall. The woman compliments, “I really like what you’ve done with the exposed brick.”
Don't let us vote Earl or the surgeon with the biggest breasts wins easy.
This is so brilliant I give you my blessing to not have to think for the rest of the day.
In fact, this idea is so good my wife will be riveted to such a show.
Oh goody! Can I be the second contestant, please? I have to have a rather large stone removed from my kidney and we could pick my surgeon!
I'm positive you are on to something here, Earl.
Thanks for making me laugh - I'm presently in so much pain that not much is very funny. But I can always count on you!
How about... "Doctor Who?"; "Suddenly Surgeon"; "Welcome Back Cutter";...My wife watches "House Hunters", too. I can't believe it...Did they choose the two bedroom Craftsman with the large lot or the two-story fixer-upper with the two-car garage...or the... My question is, how many of the buyers still own their homes after the "meltdown". Now THAT would be a show!
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