Grey's Anatomy Episode 6.04 Tainted Obligation

We're about as happy to see Thatcher, Meredith's alcoholic dad, as she is, especially when we learn that years of drinking have given him liver failure and he needs a donation, stat!

Lexie isn't a match and is crushed when Meredith doesn't immediately volunteer her liver. Meredith tells Izzie she doesn't plan to see if she's a match, "I barely know the guy." Cristina urges her on, mostly so she can get in on a surgery: "Mama needs to cut!" she says.

We'd feel Cristina's pain at not being on any surgeries, but she's so shameless at trying to manipulate everyone around her that we have to laugh. Her offer to a doctor who heard she's "hardcore into cardio," ("I can be hardcore into anything you want."), sounds like a come-on of a whole different kind!

Lexie asks Miranda to lie to the transplant board that her dad's been sober a year so he'll qualify, but Miranda flat-out refuses, so Lexie pulls Meredith's files and finds she is a blood-match. "I know he's not your dad. But you have his blood and I don't, so please, give me my dad." she begs. When Thatcher learns Meredith is the donor, he won't accept it. "I won't let you put me back together," he insists. "I put you through enough."

We're proud of Meredith for not listening to him. "You're not my father," she tells him. "If you die, it probably won't change my life that much. But if you did, it will break Lexie." And Lexie, her dad and we pretty much dissolve into tears. And we might get a little weepy when Miranda tells Meredith, who's just been put under, "I had five interns. Four of you have been on this table. One of you has cancer, one of you died. You better not pull anything funny on me, Grey."

Cristina overhears that a surgery is "high-risk" and volunteers without knowing that it's for a penile implant! We all have a good laugh at her expense, but it drives her to confront the chief with an unexpected ultimatum: She asks to be cut! We're shocked, but we know Cristina well enough to know she means it when she says she'd rather lose her job than her gift.

Izzie persuades Owen to do a risky surgery on a cancer patient who only has a 13 percent chance of survival, and is devastated when the man dies. Owen is furious, saying he was wrong to put her on the case. "You weren't ready. You cannot be a patient and a doctor here. You have to choose."

Callie has been working herself up to ask the Chief for her job back but before she even asks, he tells her to show up to work tomorrow.