- Greg joins the Army Reserve against Dharma's wishes. Abby has a baby shower.
- Fascinated by general Kirby's war memories praising his dad Edward, Greg decides to join the Army Reserve corps, which recruits top-graduates like him at the grade of Captain. Pacifist Dharma is dead against anything military, but for once her bossy dictatorial nonsense is ignored. The new officer flies to Virginia for a course in procurement, where he shows annoying enthusiasm in both the matter and meaningless military decorum. Meanwhile Edward's 'reassuring' remark landing in a war zone is highly unlikely suffices to make Dharma realize darling Greg's well-being counts for more then political principles.—KGF Vissers
- Greg is fascinated when a General Kirby (Robert Loggia) comes to visit and regales him with Edward's stories from back when he was in the war. Edward once saved a soldier's life by keeping his hand inside the soldier's open chest, to keep him from bleeding out. Edward led his troops when enemy artillery was landing shells all over the place and the new Lieutenant just out of WestPoint had wet his pants.
All Greg has is paintball stories. Greg is intrigued by the army reserves program which allows professionals to enlist for short service commissions. The program requires one weekend a month and 2 weeks out of the year to help out. The General had said that a guy with Greg's background could start as a Captain or even a Major. Edward was only a Captain. Dharma forbids it and would only allow Greg to be a cowboy or a train conductor. Dharma draws the line at joining the army reserves. A small war breaks out as Dharma stages a protest to halt Greg's plans to enlist in the Army. Greg is upset as Dharma always stood for everybody doing their own thing. Dharma says that this is more about Greg wanting to wear a Uniform and march around as a figure of authority. Greg calls Dharma a hypocrite. Greg enlists regardless and flies to Virginia. Even at the last second, Dharma tries to stop Greg by asking him to join the one feet high club, by "doing It" at the airport.
Dharma and Greg host a baby shower for Abby at their apartment. Marci brings a cute Onesie. Itty gifts her a music box. Larry calls it a mindless gladiator for a fascist war machine. Larry says that marriage is about letting the other person grow in ways that you cannot predict. She has to trust that everything is going to work out fine. Edward tells Dharma that Greg is not going to be in any danger, he is going to be sitting at a desk pushing paper, unless an actual war breaks out. In a war, it doesn't matter what anyone's job is. Everybody grabs a gun and joins the battle.
Dharma has nightmares about Greg getting killed in combat. Greg company is made of lawyers who are huddled in a trench and their retreat is cut off, while the enemy advances on their position. Their commanding officer says that the men will have to fight hand to hand and go over the trench to survive. Greg makes a plan to bury the enemy in paperwork. He volunteers to deliver the plan to the enemy but is blown along the way. Greg is meanwhile disappointed that he only made Captain and not Major.
Dharma goes to General Kirby, who assures Dharma that Greg is in a non-combat role and there is no chance for him to get hurt. Dharma asks Kirby to put Greg in a combat role, so she can insist that he returns home. But once he does, the legal eagle's stuffy style has the troops ready to boot him out of boot camp. Greg returns and waits for Dharma at the airport in full army uniform. A retired sergeant approaches him and asks about his service. Greg reluctantly discloses that he served for 2 weeks. The sergeant is furious since he dodged bullets in Korea and was shot in the behind and still made Sergeant. He says that he was left for dead for more than 2 weeks and walks away.
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