Apparently, Michael sees himself as Dunder Miflin’s answer to Bette Midler in “For the Boys” – he has to keep the troops entertained – which tonight involves doing that old pretending to go down the stairs bit. Ha!
Jan calls Michael to report that Ed Truck – his old boss – has died over the weekend (this was the only reason she called. She did not call because she missed him, as he thought - or wanted to think.) Michael seems sad and fishes for sympathy. He manages to force a hug from Pam. Meanwhile, back at Stanford, Jim has to serve as project manager to the sexy co-worker, who was delinquent in getting a report to Josh. She’s quite resentful. That is, of course, until the flirting begins – all over getting the gal a bag of her favorite chips. Ed apparently was decapitated in a drunk driving accident. Michael (courtesy of Dwight) breaks the graphic news to the staff. Dwight uses the incident to ask Angela to put his head on ice in case he should die before her. Michael and Jan discuss what to do to honor Ed’s memory – Jan suggests a day off for the staff. Michael suggests a statue. A moving statue with light-up eyes. Basically, a robot – according to Dwight. Michael’s grisly musings about Ed’s demise are disturbing the gang. He doesn’t understand why everybody jus wants to work. They are all in denial (in the Kubler-Ross scale), according to Michael – he doesn’t need them to get to “acceptance” – he just wants to get them to “depression”.
Michael decides a grief counseling session is in order, so he gets everyone together for an exercise where a ball is thrown and the recipient of said ball must relate a story of someone who they lost and how they felt. Roy pops into the conference room and asks to talk to Pam with some story about her car - primarily to rescue her from grief counseling session, but also to see how she’s doing (Has he really turned over a new leaf, or is he just faking it to get her back?) Jim is still looking for the chips. At least the gal has good taste – Jim and Salt and Vinegar – yum. Fortunately (?) for Pam, Michael waited for Pam to return before continuing the session. Apparently, Dwight had a twin, but assimilated him in the womb. Pam tells the tale of her aunt, a female boxer who was paralyzed and asked her manager to remove her breathing tube. Ryan lost his relative, Mufasa, to a pack of wilderbeasts. The reference to “Weekend at Bernie’s” finally got to Michael and he got upset. Toby said he saw a bird fly into the glass door and die that morning – which finally brings Michael to the brink. He loses it.
Michael tries to resuscitate the bird to no avail. He arranges for a 4pm funeral service for the bird. Meanwhile Jim and his co-worker are still on the “Great Chip Quest” – flirting all the way. Has he found a Pam replacement? Dwight attempts to fashion a makeshift coffin for the bird out of a soda can. Not working. Pam offers a pimped-out Kleenex box and asks Dwight to bring his recorder to the service for a musical tribute. Meanwhile, Jim found the elusive chips - in the building next door (after an elaborate series of phone calls.) The bird is laid to rest - complete with a touching eulogy from Pam, a recorder performance from Dwight and a funeral pyre (which Dwight later violently stamps out.) Hey Office producers/writers - we need Jim back in Scranton! Oh, and I’m sure if you’re a fan, you’ve probably already seen this, but it is pretty funny - the cast n’ crew reading a piece Jenna (Pam) Fischer wrote for Esquire magazine. Enjoy!
