Michael is so excited about his business trip to Winnipeg. In addition to the expected perks of international travel by business class, he thinks "concierge" means "geisha," and this actually works out for him -- right up until his walk of shame, after which Michael unloads on David Wallace for transferring Holly. Michael actually looks pretty good with that pair he just grew.
Andy and Oscar tag along and end up, surprisingly, bonding over Long Island iced teas and an ill-advised drunk-dial home to Angela about why Andy isn't getting any. After that, he'll be getting even less.
Back at the office, everyone is way too excited for Jim about Pam's expected return date, a week hence. But there's a crimp in the plan when it turns out that Pam needs to retake a class and stay in New York another three months. But then she decides not to, and return to Scranton instead, so it's all okay.
Pam's return means that Ryan will be moving to the annex to sit near Kelly, and he finally hits on what it takes to win her back: push-ups. He gets her to break up with Darryl, but loses all interest when the deed is done. Oh, Ryan. And oh, Kelly.
Even the promo guy is now saying "That's what she said."
In the conference room, Michael is regaling the assembled troops with half-understood facts about different cultures, like how Italians consider it polite to wash your hands after you go to the bathroom. The reason for this is that he's all excited about being sent to Canada on a business trip, having always been intrigued by things international: "The women, the pancakes, the man of mystery," he THs. Michael then asks Meredith to pretend she's from Abu Dhabi, so he can cover her face with his suit jacket. "You are now sexy in your culture," he pronounces. Poor Meredith.
Jim's in a good mood this morning. "T-minus...?" Kevin asks him at the copy machine. "Six point five days," Jim grins, and Kevin pats him on the butt, sending that grin flying. Later, at Jim's desk, Creed goes even further. I don't want to talk about it. Jim THs about how excited everyone is for him about Pam's scheduled return in a week. "And involved. And intrusive. And weird." That includes Phyllis and even Stanley.
Michael's in his office on his speakerphone to David Wallace, talking about Michael's upcoming trip. David THs that he thought this would be good for Michael since Holly's transfer, and it does seem to have improved his mood. "Aaand it's pretty tough to find someone who wants to go to Winnipeg in mid-November," Wallace adds. Michael is also excited about flying business class, which he's got this whole idea of. "Well, I'm just glad you're happy, because I felt bad," Wallace says. "That is all in the past," Michael breezes. Wallace even suggests that Michael check with the hotel concierge about local nightlife. "They have one of those?" Michael asks, awed. This is the first clue that maybe that word does not mean what he thinks it means.
Michael rolls his three suitcases out into the bullpen (including the two empties for souvenirs). Dwight lectures Michael about his money belt until he gets brushed off and washes his hands of the whole enterprise. We learn that Andy's going along as Michael's translator, for which he's donned a dopey beret and is using an even dopier accent to say French words that everybody knows anyway. Angela tells him to be good. She's serious, too. "I will try to get other dudes laid," he assures her. "That could have been you , if you hadn't forgotten French," Michael tells Jim. Oscar's also going along for accounting or whatever, and he's less excited about it than Jim would have been. "Our Town Car awaits!" Michael says, willfully ignoring Meredith as she corrects him that it's just a van. Well, she would know.
What the hell is the budget for this never-ending documentary anyway? They're even springing for airfare for the crew. Michael's all king-of-the castle in business class as Andy and Oscar head past him on their way to coach. In flight, Michael leans around the divider to show off his DVD player, which Andy also brought one of. "Harry and the Hendersons!" yells Andy over his headphones. Oscar offers to share his egg salad sandwiches with Michael, and gets mocked for his trouble: "Could you have picked something stinkier to bring on a plane?" Michael says. "My God, Oscar, do you have a bag of baby poop in there too?" He turns to a flight attendant to ask for a menu, and is only briefly thrown when he's informed there's no meal service. He announces that he'll take a nap, using his complimentary sleeping mask, or "blindfold," as he calls it. And then he gets slammed in the knee by the drinks cart. Nighty-night.
Because Ryan is going to be moved back to the annex after Pam's return, he heads in there to scope things out. And not just the work area, if you know what I mean. Kelly mildly reminds him that she's with Darryl, so he tries to impress her with some push-ups. "Is that supposed to impress me?" she asks. So he switches to one hand. Kelly THs that she's done with Ryan for good. And then we cut to them making out on the desk.
Michael, Andy and Oscar arrive at the hotel and Oscar checks them in while Michael and Andy go to meet the concierge. She's a blonde, bored-looking woman who seems knowledgeable about the area, as concierges tend to be. Michael is quite impressed with her magical skills. Andy gets slick: "Where might you find yourself on a Winnipeg night like this?" She names a place in the financial district. Michael THs about how he thinks a concierge is like a geisha in Winnipeg, "Trained in the fine art of fanciness and pleasure." I'm expecting this to go either very well or very badly for him. I should have realized that it's going to be both.
Pam calls Jim from New York with some bad news: she's failing her computer design course. Jim tries to cheer her up with some jokes, but it stops being funny when she says she has to stay and retake the class. Wow, that sounds expensive. And heartbreaking. Pam asks Jim if he can do another three months of this. Jim bravely tells her that she's there to follow her dream, and "when you come back, you come back the right way, right?". I sense from Pam's quick ending of the call, and her tearful expression afterward that that wasn't what she wanted to hear.
Michael, Andy and Oscar arrive at the bar Marie named and find her there. Before they head over to talk to her, Oscar says he'll leave after one drink. "Yeah, with a hot slab of Canadian bacon in your hand," Andy says supportively. They approach Concierge Marie, and Michael acts all awkwardly formal with her, while Oscar is embarrassed for everyone. In the entire world. Andy brings it to the level by bringing Michael and Marie a glass of wine each and telling them, "Let me get a picture of you guys." Michael philosophically THs, "Everybody is going to die someday, and I think it's better to die with some people that you like -- like Oscar, and Andy, and Concierge Marie -- than to know that there's somebody out there that you love that you're not with." Ooh, perhaps all is not well with Michael after all.
Andy, his work done with Michael and Concierge Marie, turns his attention to being Oscar's wingman. "Those two dudes are as good as naked," he tells Oscar, pointing over at a couple of businessmen whom he's decided are gay. "Beer me dos Long Island iced teas, sil vous plait," he calls to the bartender, and on the way to delivering them to the guys' table, he whispers to a reluctant Oscar, "You will thank me when they spank thee." Of course the two guys shoot Andy down, and he leaves the table with the drinks. "Dude, you struck out," Andy reports back to Oscar. "Drink up."
Michael has buttonholed Marie in a booth to quiz her about concierge stuff. He remains impressed, and she's clearly digging the attention.
A considerable amount of alcohol later, Oscar and Andy are drunkenly discussing Angela, and Oscar has a serious question for her fiancé: "How can anyone stand that woman?" Andy doesn't take offense, but lists her finer attributes, the last of which is, "I can't wait to have sex with her." This as we see Concierge Marie making out with Michael in the alley and then leading him away. Back to Oscar and Andy: Oscar wants to know what's wrong with Angela. Wait, is this an hour-long episode and nobody told me? So Andy ends up drunk-dialing Angela. "What is wrong with you?" is how he greets her. "Why won't you do Andy?" Oscar adds, shocked at himself. On the other end of the line, Angela is confused and irritated, but Andy presses the issue: "I wanna take you to sex school!" Good thing he's drunk enough not to really register the whispers of "Who is that, Monkey?" on Angela's end of the conversation. Man, that is going to be such a blow-up when the time comes. Realizing Andy is drunk, Angela tells him they'll discuss it later. "Naked!" Andy insists. "We'll discuss it naked!"
Michael is summarily dismissed from Concierge Marie's room. At least she puts his shoes out in the hallway so he doesn't have to do the walk of shame barefoot.
Back at the office, everyone in the bullpen is staring seriously at Jim. "How does everybody know already?" he asks. Dwight's the only one who didn't know Pam failed art school, although he's not surprised, as he's been taking apart her painting of the building. Everyone else futilely tries to shush him. Jim gets up for some coffee instead of engaging. Hey, what happened to Jim? Dwight should be lying scattered in tiny little pieces at his feet by now, each of them only vaguely aware of what Jim just did to it.
The morning, Andy meets up with Oscar in the lobby, and they agree that they had fun together last night. "Thanks for trying to hook me up," Oscar says sincerely. "That's what I do," Andy says modestly. "You get the whole nine nards." Oscar chuckles, in part because he can't believe they actually called Angela. Andy is horrified to realize that last night's call was real and not something he dreamed. He's still watching his world crash around himself when Michael joins them. "Slept like a baby," he says. Well, maybe that's why Concierge Marie kicked him out. Ever see a baby sleep? It's very thrashy.
In the break room back at the office, Ryan makes out with Kelly some more and manipulates her into breaking up with Darryl via a text message that he's already written for her. If she doesn't? No more push-ups. "We'll press send together," Ryan says, and they do. Darryl almost instantly responds with a text that "it's cool," which completely wrecks this whole thing for Ryan. And Darryl struts out of the building to his truck.
At the client's office, Michael makes his presentation, but he's clearly off his game, getting stuck at the point of the pitch where he says that DM clients appreciate being "treated like human beings." Hmm.
At the airport gate, Andy reports to Oscar that Angela's pissed enough to demote him to first base. "I get to kiss her forehead." The two of them bond some more. "Wingmen for life," Andy says. "WMFL." Oscar doesn't want a chest pump or a bro-hug, but offers a handshake. "Back to basics," Andy says appreciatively. Andy THs about going to Canada "to get to know a guy who sits twenty feet away from me. And he's delightful!"
As they're boarding, Michael's on his cell phone with David Wallace, who is happy to hear that Michael made the sale. Totally misreading Michael's tone, he says it sounds like it was a good trip. To which Michael takes lengthy and specific exception, complaining about everything from the airport shuttle to the letdown of business class to the hotel. "And thanks for the tip on the concierge, that was great..." David wants to try to talk Michael down, but Michael isn't hearing it. Everyone else has passed him to get on the plane by now (except the camera crew, of course) as he says, "No, David, you listen to me. Why did you send her away? That...God! You knew I liked her and you just...sent her away. And that...that was a sucky thing to do, man. That was a really sucky thing to do." And then he stone-cold hangs up on his boss.
Back in business class on the way home, Michael does a VO about why he's stayed at Dunder Mifflin so long, even when he could get paid so much more as a doctor or professional athlete: it's about respect. "A boss that will not fire you even though you tell him off to his face, right over the phone? That's respect." Wow. As much as he might miss Holly, he can still miss the point even more.
Kevin congratulates Jim on making it through day one. And then Jim comes out of the building to see Pam waiting for him in the parking lot. "I'm coming back the wrong way," she announces. She insists that she realized she doesn't even like graphic design, and she missed Scranton, but it's not about Jim. Could they possibly be happier to see each other? "I know you said to come home the right way, but, you can't tell me what to do, got it?" she says sweetly. They kiss. But not for too long, because of course Dwight appears at Jim's elbow, asking Pam for some photocopies. "I'm not going inside," she says. "All right," Dwight relents. "First thing in the morning, then." Coming from him, that's almost like a hug.
In the tag, Kelly and Ryan do a joint TH, talking about how they're back together. One of them is really excited about it, too. "I realized that for whatever reason, I just can't do better than Kelly," Ryan says. Just in case it's not clear, he's not the one who's excited.
M. Giant is a Minneapolis-based writer with a wife, a son, and a number of cats that seems to have settled at around two. Learn waaaay too much about him at Velcrometer, follow him on Twitter (mgiant), or just e-mail him at m.giant[at]gmail.com.
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