Life In The Office

For my first recap of the season, I think I actually drew a golden episode. The idea of the warehouse staff winning a lottery pool and quitting all at the same time, I thought, was a very novel concept and a great idea for an office episode. I really enjoyed this episode, starting from the Cold Opening, where Oscar really takes command, and then backs down at the very end. Unlike last weeks cold opening, where Bob mentioned that they portrayed Kevin as a bumbling idiot; his inferior intelligence is much more understated in this week’s Cold Opening – Jim, Dwight, Darryl and Andy are walking into the parking lot after lunch and find Oscar and Erin standing by an unfamiliar car. Oscar is appalled that the owner left a dog in the car under the sweltering sun. Kelly, Meredith and Kevin show up and they all argue about whether or not to save the dog from it’s automobile inferno. Dwight then pours some of his drink into the car through the sunroof to give the dog something to cool him down. Which begs the question, “If the sunroof is down, then air is getting into the car, so why is everyone making such a big deal over this?” Kevin decides that he will get into his car as well and when he starts dying, he’ll honk the horn three times which means, “SAVE THE DOG!!”. Oscar has had enough and comes over with a crow bar. He declares that the owner has been gone long enough and has lost his right to a window and promptly breaks it to give the dog some much needed air. Everyone is shocked at Oscar’s display but then cheers him on. He breaks one of the car’s tail lights for good measure. Then Jim brings up the obvious question that no one has thought of, “Who’s going to take the dog?” When Oscar wonders why they would take the dog Jim replies, again with the obvious answer, “What if he jumps out and runs away?” Which the dog then attempts to do. Dwight commands the dog in German, “Naiyn! Sitz!” Which means, “No! Sit!” and the dog is intimidated enough to listen (either that or it understands German). Then Jim asks Oscar if he wants a dog to which Oscar responds by taping a piece of cardboard over the window and punching four holes in it to allow for air flow. Satisfied, everyone heads into the building just as Kevin begins to honk. He makes it to the second honk before he passes out with his head leaning on the horn and we fade into the opening credits listing to the constant blast of Kevin’s car horn.

We come back to Andy’s voice over explaining that the warehouse staff won the lottery and they all quit.  Cut to a flashback of all the warehouse workers coming up to the office to celebrate and collectively throw it in their white-collar faces.  Andy states that morale has been low in the office ever since and it’s his job to get the employees back to work and get Darryl to hire a new warehouse crew.

Darryl looks crest fallen after a call from his ex-wife, which he has newly reconnected with, where she pretty much dumps him and asks for his best friend Glenn’s phone number; who did win the money.  He explains that he stopped contributing to the warehouse lottery pool after he was promoted up to the office and they won playing his birthday.

Everyone talks about what they would do if they won the lottery which begins a debate between Jim and Pam as to whose fantasy they would actually live out; if and when it ever happens.  Jim seems like more of a country boy, wanting a big house in Maine where he could either bike or kayak to his place of business which would either be a bicycle or kayak shop and Pam wants to live in a townhouse in NYC and soak in all the creative inspiration from her terrace to then be interpreted in her paintings.  Meredith suggests that they should settle the argument by getting divorced.  Kelly decides that she would just keep working and take only $1 a year for her salary.  However, being ever the model employee, she would come in at noon and not do anything she didn’t want to do.

After a failed Mr. T impression, Andy realizes that it’s going to take a while to get Darryl motivated to hire anyone so he asks for volunteers for warehouse duty until they can hire a new staff.  Erin volunteers and when no one else raises their hand to help her, Andy suggests Jim, who then tricks Dwight into volunteering as well by stating that he is the strongest person in the office; to which he knew that Dwight could not resist the urge to challenge. Finally, Andy volunteers Kevin, ’cause lets face it, he doesn’t do much of anything anyway.  Kevin is appalled and tells the camera he will not do a good job.

Phyllis has an important order that has to go out by 5 pm.  Dwight declares that he will load all 300 boxed by himself as he jumps into the fork lift and promptly drives it into the wall.  It was one of the funniest mishaps in a long time.  You can view Dwights short trip as well as take your own trip down memory lane in the Warehouse Whirlwinds video below:

He then starts loading the boxes by hand, one at a time.

Andy has a heart to heart with Darryl and gets him to start the process of hiring a new crew.  He gathers a bunch of prospects in the conference room and begins a general orientation.  After Darryl seems apathetic and goes on to explain that the old crew won the lottery and is all off doing new and interesting things (albeit some of them sound downright stupid, I mean an energy drink for Asian homosexuals; really?)  Andy asks the prospects to leave for a second and again brings up the idea that Darryl is having trouble dealing with the fact that he didn’t win the lottery.  Darryl insists that he’s ok and agrees to go forward with the interviews.  The candidates are brought back in after helping themselves to refreshments in the kitchen (one of them even helped themselves to Stanley’s lunch), Darryl starts asking them questions.  The first being, “Why do you want to work here?”  When one of them simply replies that he needs a job Darryl interjects saying that is not a good enough answer and goes on to explain that life is too short to just take the first job that comes along because before you know it, 10 years go by and your stuck there.  He then leaves the room, leaving Andy to talk to these candidates about warehouse work which he knows absolutely nothing about.  They all leave after realizing that Andy is an idiot and Andy goes to confront Darryl in the break room.  Darryl responds to Andy’s berating by simply telling him to fire him and put him out of his misery.  Andy is flabbergasted.  He was not expecting Darryl to just give up like that.  He may have some management chops after all.

Down in the warehouse, the boxes of paper are getting loaded slower than ever.  Kevin is down on all fours trying to carry a box on his back like a donkey (which falls off and gets damaged) next Dwight gives a guttural groan while loading a box and then looks at his co-workers and says (and this is my favorite quote from the episode), “What’s the problem?  Grunting is scientifically proven to add more power.  Ask any female tennis player; or her husband.”  It’s true Dwight, I’ve had some pretty disgusting thoughts run through my head while watching tennis matches.  When Erin decides to give it a try, she hurls her box under the truck and damages that one too.  Clearly what they are doing isn’t working, so they start to brain storm.  Kevin suggests greasing up the boxes and sliding them across the warehouse to the loading dock, just like his sisters used to do to him across the kitchen floor when he was little.  Jim and Dwight think it’s ridiculous and Erin tells him to drop it.

Andy goes out and finds three new candidates for the warehouse by asking Oscar who in the gay community he finds most bulked up and the strongest.  When he gets them in the conference room, one is some strange economist with a straggly beard and a Wednesday through Friday teaching schedule, one has an unclassified hearing problem (that isn’t technically a hearing problem) and one is wearing a tank top that says something about his biceps, but I can’t really tell what it is since half the sentence is blurred out, probably due to profanity.  He’s pretty muscular and Oscar is checking him out through the window. Andy decides that this is the best he’s going to get and hires them.

Down in lobby, Jim and Pam are having coffee and deciding on where they’ll live after they win the lottery.  Pam has moved her fantasy to the south of France, while Jim is firm on Maine.  Dwight and Jim return to the warehouse after their coffee run and find Erin and Kevin with a can of grease and a mop trying out Kevin’s sliding idea.  In a joint talking head they explain that it’s not the dumbest idea, but it’s not the greatest one.  The fact remains that they have to move the boxes and it’s clear they’re not going to carry them; so sadly, it’s the best idea on the table.  As they are talking there is a quick cut to them trying out the idea with a few boxes stacked on a trash can lid (it’s pure slapstick entertainment).  Kevin is excited and walks behind the couch that Jim and Dwight are giving their talking head on and as he explains that he thinks they’re ready to….. he slips and falls flat on his back right behind them.

Darryl comes out of the elevator into the lobby and Andy is waiting there with his new crew.  Instead of being grateful, he just asks Andy to fire him again.  When Andy protests, the real truth comes out; Darryl wants Andy’s job.  He felt like he earned it and then was passed over when Robert California became CEO.  He wants Andy to give him the manager’s position and Andy refuses. Andy pulls out the big guns and goes on to tell Darryl exactly why he doesn’t belong in the manager’s seat:  He’s short with people, he hired his buddy Glenn to replace him in the warehouse and Glenn was under-qualified, He has no business education, he was going to take classes under DeAngelo, and when Andy asks what happened with that, Darryl just replies that DeAngelo died.  Andy responds that DeAngelo didn’t die, only his brain died and that his brain is very much alive and he’d be happy to to give him business classes if Darryl would only ask.  Darryl replies that he was too busy because of his daughter. But Andy counters that he had time for a baseball clinic and Mediterranean cooking classes.  Darryl gets upset but then Andy reminds him that Jo saw something in him and she gave him the shot, but then he stopped pushing and she noticed.  It’s clear that Darryl doesn’t really have what it takes to be the Office Manager.  So he agrees that Andy shouldn’t fire him.  Then he gives a TH with my next favorite quote of the episode, “My future is not going to be determined by 7 little white lotto balls, it’s going to be determined by two big black balls.  I control my destiny, I do.”  and just like that, Darryl is back.

He and Andy walk to the warehouse discussing strategies for a new crew and happen upon Jim, Dwight, Kevin and Erin and their makeshift lane of paper boxes, mopping grease down the middle.  Both of them want to know what is going on and Jim tells them that they thought they could come up with a more efficient way of doing things.  Erin insists that Jim explain what it’s called.  Jim is both hesitant and embarrassed and tells Darryl and Andy that the system is called Senior Loadenstein because Porque es moui rapido.  So there you go, I’ve incorporated three languages in this reacap – German, Spanish and, of course, English.  Darryl then insists on seeing it and Erin gets on a sled with a helmet on her head and sits between two stacks of paper boxes loaded on the sled and Jim and Dwight  propel her using a rope that’s threaded through it; after a count of Uno, Dos, Tres…Erin is sliding down the lane that leads to the back of the truck.  We cut to a Phyllis talking head as she sadly admits to losing her client.  Senior Loadenstein very well may be the best thing since Flonkerton folks.

The tag scene is a series of talking heads where the office workers continue talking about their fantasies of what they would do if they won the lottery.  Creed says he already won the lottery, he was born in the US of A baby, but as back-up he has a Swiss passport.  Toby says he would spend a lot of time launching his true crime podcast, The Flenderson Files.  Jim and Pam have come to an agreement, they are going to live in a stunning pre-war brownstone at the top of a mountain; it’s city and country combined.  It’s just a short subway ride away from some of the best museums in the world and Jim can fish right from the window of Pam’s pottery studio.  And, they can chat anytime they want; just like now.  The schools are terrible though, but what are you going to do?  I guess it’s a commute to an upscale private school in the city for Cee Cee and the new baby. LOL

Well there you have it folks; I think this is shaping up to be a pretty good season so far.  I’m really enjoying the new dynamic and nuances to the show.  What do you all think?  Sound off in the comments or on the message boards.

Until next time,

~Suri (aka HDF)