When the paper doesn't get delivered for a few days, Ben observes that Katz is hooked on the news. Katz denies it and bets him that he can go longer without news than Ben can go without talking. ("What kind of bet is that?" asks Laura. "Crazy bet," says Katz.) After a day of it, Ben is still holding on (sort of), and they flip each other off over breakfast ("Ben, just because you can't talk doesn't mean you can't use a napkin"). Ben calls Laura and mostly doesn't talk, instead playing a harmonica, trumpet and drums. He also visits Todd at the video store, where he also talks a little bit, and writes a note ("Me no talk now"). Meanwhile, Katz is going through news withdrawal. Stan tells him he's missed out on Eric Clapton's assassination of Neil Diamond ("I saw that coming," says Katz), and Gary Coleman's multi-year contract with the Yankees. Ben, unable to go any longer, orders the paper to be delivered again (all without talking, just grunting the numbers over the phone). Finally, they both give up ("Give me the f------ paper!" yells Katz). Then they have to argue over who lost the last bet, over whether or not duct tape was made out of ducks (seems Ben lost that one). NOTES: This marks the first time that Katz himself has to be bleeped. It's also, I believe, the first time we've seen him sit on the floor of his waiting room -- a rather odd position for him. No one is credited as the newspaper lady on the phone, but it sounds like Laura to us. Also, this is the first time a patient has brought outsiders into his session.

• Sam Brown: Went to a spa, where he demanded that THEY relax HIM; a "new age water buffalo" got into the mineral pool to cradle him; he scraped his head on the side of the pool; brings his family in for group therapy; his mom says he was needy, but "he was so weird, I couldn't even touch him"; he considered the mental institution he stayed at "a home away from the home I never had"; he's in the Guinness Book, "right next to the fat bikers."
• Paul F. Tompkins: The "F" is for Francis; he uses it because it looks classy "to people who like letters"; uses beer as medication; liked Guinness beer because "it'll knock you on your a--, Jack," and because they sponsor an annual contest encouraging drunks to ramble on about why they love the stuff, and then the winner gets his own Irish pub; doesn't understand people who get screwed up by Daylight Saving Time ("Is this milk still good? Who's the president?"); doesn't like alternative people who walk around with alternative pets, like iguanas, on their bodies.

Review:

Sam Brown bringing his mother and sister in for group therapy is a wonderful twist on the old formula, and it's funny, too. We also enjoy Paul F. Tompkins's inspired sarcasm: He doesn't just make a joke, he makes the joke then goes on and on about it (like the part about becoming pen pals with the alternative guy and then binding the letters together in a book called, "My Correspondence with the Most Interesting Person Alive"). We're suckers for sarcasm. And who would have thought Ben NOT talking could be as funny as Ben talking? The whole bet is so childish and stupid, and the two take it so not-seriously ("I think it's safe to say I've talked more in the last two days than I have my whole life," says Ben), yet at the same time, they pretend their lives are at stake over it. When this show works, that's why it works: It's two grown men treating something with false importance, and readily admitting that's what they're doing. A solid, classic episode.GRADE: A

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