Regarding vagin-writing, I think I figured out recently just *why* House can't have the best friend + 'flavor of the week' dynamic that so many shows had before, allowing them to compartmentalize serious emotional bond (with the best friend) and lust (for the hot T&A 'whoever-she-is-this-week').

The writers seem intent to keep writing vaginity into House in hopes that eventually Hugh/the character itself will click with some of it and make easier his necessitated slide into heteronormativity. Except House can't be a regular 'guy' about this. He can't have casual sex with near-strangers.

He can buy hookers, because they are professionals. But his issues with his leg and his addiction to Vicodin basically proscribe any casual sexual hook-ups. He wouldsn't risk baring himself to a casual hook-up; nor could he trust her to know how to work around his leg; nor could he expect her to actually work to accomodate him; and frankly, the odds are he can't even get it up, what with all the pain and the Vicodin.

So a casual sex hook-up is right out. He can flirt with the women all he wants, but his flirting isn't real and life-affirming - it's bitter, because he knows he can't have any of what the women keep waving at him. It's just not worth the trouble, on any level. And a deeper romantic relationship is even more out, considering that he can barely even let Wilson in, and they've known each other what, 15 years now? 20? No way any bint is going to waltz off the street and suddenly have House offer his heart on a platter. He wouldn't be House any longer if he did that.

In conclusion: the writers wrote poor House into a corner: celibacy or Wilson. Because Wilson knows everything, accepts everything, and loves House.

And, of course, House loves him back longtime. =D