The Mindy Project – Nurses Strike 

Morgan, Tamra, Colette & every nurse in Mindyland finally realized that they are treated terribly, the doctors don’t know how to do basic doctor things anymore & Leo’s pediatrician to the stars has a nurse that Mindy is tooootaaally going to fall in love with.

After officially breaking up with Danny & rejecting Danny last week, Mindy is being an *music note* independent woman and making pancakes for Leo. Before she almost uses Advils instead of chocolate chips (they ARE sugar coated) she smells cookies, thinks she’s having a stroke, then follows the smell upstairs, where Jody is having an open house to sell the second apartment. Legally, he can’t stop her from bidding on it though so that’s what she’s going to do!

At the office, she’s meeting with Melville Fuller, the practices accountant and my favourite character, to see if she can afford the down payment. As it turns out, after the finance fiasco with Whitney, Mindy is now totally great with money. Even still, she needs an extra 25 thousand dollars for the apartment because Manhattan real estate is actually insane. Sweet Morgan wants to help but he has no money, as per usual.

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We take a break from this real estate drama to visit Leo’s pediatrician because he has an ear infection. Nasim Pedrad is perfectly cast as Dr. Malouf, pediatrician to the stars (according to Kanye & New York Magazine). who is impossible to get a hold of and kinda bitchy. Her nurse, Ben, played by sweet, perfect, love of my life, Bryan Greenberg, wants to teach Mindy a trick about the ear drops but she & Dr. Malouf just laugh him out of the room

Mindy goes back to the office, very disheveled because she chased a Pokemon into a hot dog cart that then tipped over on her, and sees Brendan Deslauriers (weird beard 2) in the conference room, looking to hire a doctor for the midwife offices. Mindy sends him away and says none of them would ever do that because it’s so embarrassing. Then it is time for the nurses to announce that they want to unionize. Jeremy (& Beverly!) are against it but Mindy is happy to sign because signing things makes her feel better about never voting (everyone should vote but like also it is totally a relief to know that Mindy Lahiri doesn’t).

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Still trying to find an extra 25k, Mindy calls her mom who thinks its great that she remembered her dad’s birthday (she didn’t). When her parents moved to India, Mindy is the one who payed for the condo and now that they’re back she wants her money back. However, we learn that now isn’t a great time because Rishi needs another semester at DJ school (he’s switching majors from scratching to general studies. While I’m in this parenthetical can I just say that I hope this leads to another appearance by Pastor Casey, even though he’s not a DJ anymore!) and “Daddy’s been buying geodes on EBay again. Sonu does present her daughter with an investment opportunity though, for her album of “Jazz standards with a Sonu twist.” Sonu starts singing and Mindy hangs up on her mom faster than I do when MasterCard calls and I pick up without looking at the caller ID.

This union thing is spreading to Dr. Ledreau’s nurses and this is where Mindy learns that all this extra stuff that the nurses are demanding will have to come out of her pocket. She runs over to the office to erase her name from the petition but Tamra, Colette & Morgan walk in and catch her. She tells them to wait a couple years years but Morgan is already coughing up blood into an old pair of underwear so he has very little time left. They’re hella pissed and they walk out the room chanting “strike!”

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The next day, as the nurses promised, they’re all outside the Shulman offices, chanting a super catchy slogan. Tamra wants Mindy to at least join them on strike, citing that she could use the exercise (Jeremy agrees with the exercise part but not the strike part) but Colette spits on Jeremy’s shoes and turns the environment hostile. Jeremy, Jody & Mindy work their way through the crowd and yell out that they’ve already lined up replacements.

These “replacements” these guys were bragging about seem like they should not have valid nursing licences – AND ONE OF THEM IS BEVERLY! The doctors decide that they can do the bloodwork themselves but spoiler alert, Mindy almost kills some old lady and she & Jeremy both have blood splatter all over their lab coats. As if they weren’t having terrible days already, they run into Brendan who is trying to get Dr. Ledreau to be the on-call doctor for his midwifery business. They chase him out though so all is sort of well, for now.

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“Picketing is boring, it’s like modelling but with bad clothes.” The nurses are not having a good time and they aren’t getting anything done with the picketing, Morgan also misses talking to the doctors about books, even though he doesn’t read. The doctors aren’t fairing any better, Mindy almost fell asleep in someones “cooch” and urine samples are “sooo warm ew.” Jeremy tries to inspire them to stay strong like his idol, Margaret Thatcher (that’s why he’s wearing a string of pearls) and defeat these nurses and their silly demands like living wages and health care. *rolls eyes at doctors*

They call Morgan and invite him to lunch so they can butter him up and settle this madness but he brings along Ben (hi Ben, I love you so much), who sees right through the lunch and tells Morgan that they think he’s the weakest link so they’re using him to make a side deal and break the strike. Morgan is outraged again, chugs some syrup and he & Bae Ben roll out.

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Mindy heads back home that night and sees that Leo’s ear infection is still bothering him. She tries to call Dr. Maloof but Mindy’s not a celebrity with the special phone number so there’s no answer. Left with no choice (debatable but okay) Mindy heads to the emergency room where the nurses are not picketing. They give her grief about trying to break Morgan “that’s not cool!” but she says Leo is sick and Ben’s instincts kick in and he clears the path for her and lets her through to the ER because he’s a precious angel from heaven and I love him so much guys I can’t!

Inside, none of the usual nurses are working so the ER is a mess, on top of that Mindy wasn’t super nice to the non union nurse (who is sorta creepy, let’s be real) so she finds a spot on the floor and just sits there with Leo. Ben peers through the window and sees Mindy just sitting there, trying to make Leo feel better and calm him. IT’S SO CUTE YOU GUYS. He asks Morgan for her number, saying that he wants to prank call her. He does call, but as soon as he’s out of earshot, he tells her to meet him at her office so he can help with Leo!

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At the office, Ben is teaching Mindy his trick to get babies to lie still on their sides, which is to play their Dora (or their favourite show, but Mindy says Leo’s is entourage and that seems inappropriate for a baby.) on a tablet place in front of them to distract them. They do this to Leo, Mindy gets the drops in and the baby calms down, they even manage to put Leo to sleep.

Ben & Mindy keep chatting outside her office, she tells him he’s good with kids and he’s all hey hi hello I’m a pediatric nurse, this is what I do. We also learn that he has  A THIRTEEN YEAR OLD! In the words of Mindy: “damn dude, you started young!” She casually says that most guys in Manhattan don’t have kids until they’re like 70 AND BEN IS LIKE “GUESS I’M NOT LIKE MOST GUYS IN MANHATTAN.” BOOM. Shade at the baby daddy and the creepy southern almost sugar daddy. Mindy tries to give him money for the cab home but he won’t take it – and he shares that he’s a bouncer at Dave & Buster’s during the strike so he can make some money during the strike. Min apologizes that it’s gotten so ugly and sweet perfect Ben says that it’s okay, that nothing is “too embarrassing when it comes to your kid right.”

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The next morning, Mindy gives Jody a check for the apartment and buys it from him. She doesn’t want to tell Jody how she got the money but we find out almost immediately when Jeremy finds a Deslauriers brochure WITH MINDY’S FACE ON THE COVER (heyyy promo pic from the Fox days) and also a bus ad with a giant Mindy head on it that says “I wish I was a midwife.”

This might have been one thing that was too embarrassing, even if it was so Leo didn’t have to live in a closet. My impression from this episode is I LOVE BEN, I LOVE HIM SO MUCH YOU GUYYYYYYS! And it’s great to see Mindy stepping up and taking care of her situation by herself, oh and lastly I’m hashtag team nurses!

New episodes of The Mindy Project stream every Tuesday, only on Hulu