(S03E05) "It's not my birthday." - Patty to Alex

Hmmm ... such cryptic messages in this week's episode of 'Damages.' First the wacky dream. Dreaming about a horse in your home probably isn't so crazy, unless you're Patty Hewes and the dream includes bloody hands and feet.

Let's analyze: Patty harking back to a more innocent childhood perhaps? Nah, too straightforward. Maybe the horse signifies Danielle's child, and Ellen's message that "it's a big responsibility" and "are you sure you're ready for it" denotes Patty's willingness to take care of Danielle and her child. Well, just the child now. The "blood on her hands" isn't so hard to figure out, but her feet? It must suck to be Patty with all that running around in her head.

Between that and the muffins and cupcakes and Ellen baking the latter for Patty's birthday, there was six kinds of crazy in this ep, but that's nothing new for 'Damages.' I'm thinking there was a reference to cupcakes in a previous season, but I can't remember what it was. Anyone? Patty sent Ellen cupcakes, didn't she? And am I misremembering, or did Patty also tell Ellen "It's not my birthday" when they first met. I'm having a deja vu on that.

It's so funny -- not in a haha way -- seeing Patty and Ellen in the same room together in a civilized meeting. I keep thinking about those scenes from last season, where Ellen is pointing the gun at a bleeding Patty, then points it over her head to shoot out the surveillance camera. It's like none of that ever happened, at least on the surface. I'm sure there's all sorts of stuff festering in the psyche of that relationship.

Wonder how Alex is going to play into things as the new associate. If I was Ellen, it would have been really hard for me not to yell at Alex, "She's a whack job! You might end up dead!" Who else read more into Ellen's comment, "Well, I didn't. I wanted a life"? Yeah, as in, I'd rather stay alive.

So we still don't really know what's in the contents of that envelope of Louis', the one with "Deliver to Patty Hewes" written on it. Except for what Joe told Lenny: "It explains where the money is. He says he's coming clean for me, to free me of his legacy." Oh who are we kidding? He'll never be free of his father's legacy, and his threat to Danielle just confirms that. He's a chip off the old block. Or maybe worse.

It looks like Stuart Zedeck actually makes an appearance in next week's ep, so we'll see what happens there. With Danielle out of the way now, thanks to Carol it seems, and Patty going to see Danielle's daughter, maybe my theory about Patty's dream is on track.

And we've got yet more clues about Tom Shayes' death, particularly him calling someone -- presumably his wife -- to tell them he loved them with a bloody gut wound, then him being dragged through the door of that apartment. I guess it could have been Patty he called, but that would be weird.

Other stuff:

- Nice to see Uncle Pete again, even if he's in a dream.

- Weird scene with Lenny and the hooker, but points out how important Louis was to Lenny.

- Cool that Ellen hooked up with Josh Reston, the reporter from the UNR case last season. That relationship will play in nicely if she's feeding him tips about the Tobin case. I wonder if he's the "someone" she told David about at his grave at the end of last season.

- The writer's room for this show must be an interesting place. I wonder if they have giant storyboards all over the place mapping out the plot and characters and how they all fit together.