Michael's enjoying having to accompany Jim on a sales call a little too much. But when he returns to the office drenched from a tumble into a koi pond and faces merciless mocking from all directions, Jim's got his back. However -- too little too late, as security footage of the spill reveals that Jim did nothing to prevent Michael's fall when he easily could have. Michael feels betrayed, but learning that Jim envies his sales acumen makes it all better between them, and Michael even helps make everyone else cool with Jim.
Meanwhile, Pam and Andy are out doing cold calls together, and after being mistaken for a couple one too many times, Andy plays along. Inappropriately, of course. Let's just say he gets to feel the baby kick. On the way back, he alludes to his crush on Erin, and Pam ends up starting to facilitate what might become a new couple. Which is cute and sweet, until you remember that the last couple she did that for was Dwight and Angela, and look how that turned out.
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The Dunder Mifflin-Scranton warehouse has been transformed into a haunted house! Oooo! The doors slide open, and Michael (dressed, inappropriately enough, as one of the "Dick in a Box" guys) welcomes a bunch of kids, who are riding on a pallet truck steered by Darryl. Jim, with the word "BO-OK" inked on his face for some reason, talking-heads that it's a perfect location for a haunted house: "Legend has it on this very site, there used to be a productive paper company."
Darryl gets to one of the scenes and kind of has to improvise when Kevin, as a creepy security guard, cuts some fake intestines out of Erin, dressed as Princess Fiona, attended by Angela as a black widow and Kelly as Leeloo from The Fifth Element -- the latter two of whom Darryl misidentifies as an octopus and a burn victim, respectively. When they complain, he says, "Label yourselves or take what you get." Creed's all made up like Grandpa Munster, waving that unit of blood he stole like a year ago (holy God, it's nearly empty now, WTF), while a tall-haired Ryan tells him, "That's really not the trend in vampires right now." And I just figured out who Ryan's supposed to be, although Darryl thinks they're "an old man and a goth dude," and then mistakes Meredith for "the old crone from Drag Me to Hell." "I'm a hobo," Meredith protests. "I asked for a list," says Darryl. Dwight rides in on a bicycle as Jigsaw, and finally we learn what Jim is: "The popular social networking site known as 'BookFace.'" Oh, he's not even trying any more. Darryl's about to proceed to the candy when Michael kicks out a chair in front of them and pretends to die of hanging. The children are traumatized, of course. Then, still dangling there, he opens his eyes and gives a lecture warning against suicide. "Why is Christmas the only holiday that can have a message?" he THs. "What the hell is wrong with you?" Darryl demands. Michael answers a question with a question: "Who wants candy?" Nobody has a question to answer that question.
Michael hangs out in Jim's office, droning on about his plans for the weekend when Erin pops in to say they're both expected at an upcoming sales call in an hour, even though it was supposed to be only Jim. Michael encourages Jim to call and clear it up, which is of course nothing but a ploy to make Jim feel inadequate upon hearing that the client still wants Michael. Michael eats it up, and Jim whining-heads about it. Before leaving, Michael is all in Jim's business, even trying to get him to change watches, which Jim refuses. "He's trying to micro-co-manage me," Jim floundering-heads.
Andy and Pam are out making cold calls, since they're the two people with the lowest sales for the quarter. Andy pumps a triumphant fist. This is amazing: it means Ryan made a sale!
Jim and Michael return to the office, and for some reason. Michael is drenched. He claims they were caught in a flash-rain, and when Angela asks why Jim is dry, Jim claims, "I... outran it." Michael squishes on into his office to change his suit.
Andy makes small talk with a receptionist, claiming he and Pam are a dynamic duo. "Or trio," he amends, indicating her expanding belly. When she mistakenly assumes Andy's the father, Pam denies it a little too forcefully and laughs a little too long, so that even Andy notices.
Michael's dry but still barefoot, padding through the office when Erin tells him that the custodian at the client's office found his keys in the koi pond. "Did you say koi pond?" Stanley asks as Michael all but dives into his office. Oops, don't say "dive."
thing you know, Erin is besieged by curious people at Reception who want to know what went on. Michael tries to put them off over her speakerphone from his office, and when Oscar asks Jim if Michael fell into a koi pond, Jim will only say, "Mmmm, it's like Michael says. It was... um... some-something else." Finally Michael cracks, and everyone else cracks up. Freed from his vow of silence, Jim THs, "Truthfully, it wasn't the way he fell in. It was how long it took him to get out."
Pam and Andy are now in the prospect's office, and he makes the same mistake the receptionist did regarding their relationship. Andy tries to react like Pam did earlier, but takes it way overboard, claiming he dates models, and then adding that Pam's carrying his surrogate to maintain his girlfriend's figure. "We put our baby in Pam. Doesn't matter what Pam looks like." Clearly Andy has not seen the cover of Shape this month.
On the way out, Pam yells at Andy for being way meaner than she was, and for blowing the sale. "Let me tell you something," Andy retorts. "I was never gonna make that sale." Can't argue with that.
Erin tells Michael that David Wallace called. "He heard you made a big splash at the meeting, oh my God, that was so mean what I just said and I didn't mean it, it was Kevin and Meredith that put me up to it." Stanley advises Michael not to listen to them: "You just ignore their carping." Michael takes the encouragement as sincere until Dwight whispers, "A carp is both a fish and a term for complaining. They're mocking you with wordplay." Creed chimes in, weakly asking if he found Nemo. Michael tries to come back with another Pixar movie, Toy Story, which is not only a total non sequitur but allows Oscar to lob back, "Don't you mean 'Koi Story'?" Phyllis asks if he floundered. "I'm not usually the butt of the joke," Michael THs from his office. "I'm usually the face of the joke. I wish Jim had fallen into that pond. He'd have to put on my suit and it'd be too short. And he'd look...dammit, he'd still look good." Unless he wrote BO-OK on his face again.
Michael has called an impromptu "sensitivity training," which quickly goes off the rails when Phyllis raises her hand to point out that he makes fun of them daily. But then he wrestles it back on course by starting a "do not mock" list on a flip chart page. He starts with himself, putting "koi pond" under his name, along with "fountain," because he also fell into one of those at the mall once. Michael calls on Dwight, who reluctantly says he doesn't want people making fun of his small nose. Suddenly everyone notices Dwight has a small nose, and when he points out that it's on the list, Michael corrects, "No, I haven't finished writing," just to get one of his own in under the wire. Kevin wants his weight on the list, but Michael will only put down "huge gut." Meredith doesn't want to say hers out loud, but agrees to write "sex with a terrorist" up there, figuring it was going to come out one day anyway. At least she seems to appreciate Michael's discretion.
Pam and Andy are in another office, and when this new prospect calls them a cute couple, they both start denying it at the same time, then look at each other, and turn back and say, "Thank you." Awesome timing. They play it up a bit, to the point where Andy claims to be looking into birthing coaches. Pam gives us a creeped-out look when Andy already knows about the one the prospect recommends.
Angela has just asked not to be mocked for eating like a squirrel (which Phyllis mocks her for) when Erin interrupts the sensitivity training to report that the client wants Michael to pay for a dead koi. Michael refuses, and after a tangent from Creed about how much Michael is paying for worms, Jim calls an end to the meeting.
Andy is still going on and on, with his hand on Pam's belly and everything, when the baby kicks, and he feels it. I really hope this wasn't the first time the baby has moved. He's so amazed that he starts talking to her stomach and the "little soybean" within, putting his face right down there and everything. "Sometimes we're so excited that we forget where we are," Pam explains to the prospect, mortified.
In the conference room, Jim tries to advise Michael to head off the mocking by making fun of himself. "I am a big, stupid goofball," Jim demonstrates. Michael tells Jim he's not stupid, and has a eureka moment.
So Michael decides to try roasting himself in front of the bullpen, and it seems to actually be working, even if the actual jokes are a little weak. Phyllis points out that nobody should put a koi pond in a lobby (Jim gives us a satisfied little smirk), and Michael keeps it going: "You're right, Phyllis, but I've been there before." And then, as always, he takes it too far, saying that in high school he used to get thrown in the frozen lake. And then he gives an update from last week, when he couldn't think of five friends for his new cell phone plan. "I don't even have Jan's cell phone number and I hate her! She won't give it to me!" Choking back tears now, he calls himself a loser, and then concludes, "Too far!" He sarcastically thanks Jim for the advice and slams back into his office. Well, at least people still feel bad for him.
Oscar and Kevin watch in the break room as Angela eats like a squirrel, although Kevin stops short of actionable mocking. Meredith announces that she's got a line on the security tape of Michael's "pond dive," but Jim tries to shut that down. "You watch that tape and you're going to have to stay late for more sensitivity training," he warns. Oscar and Kevin are okay with that. Well, at least Jim took a shot at protecting Michael. Or was it Michael he was protecting?
In the car on the way back, Andy is happy with the "maybe" they got from the prospect. "Going by the Nard-Dog curve, I'd say we nailed it." Pam brings up the belly-kissing, and Andy apologizes, saying it was just fun to role-play, and he's pretty sick of being single. Like, to the point where he's already decided on a birth coach. He asks Pam what she thinks about Erin. All Pam can manage is a "Meh," without the "M."
Everyone congregates around Meredith's computer to watch the footage, and again Jim tries to shut it down. Only more forcefully this time, pulling rank and everything. But Michael tells them to go ahead, insisting he can handle it. "He can't fire all of you." And when the tape plays, the truth comes out: Despite walking right to him at the time, Jim did nothing to try to save Michael. In fact, he leaned away as Michael toppled into the drink. Everyone's kind of shocked. Michael looks at Jim in betrayal, and Jim quietly invites Michael for a talk in his office. "No," Angela says. "I didn't ask you!" Jim all but yells in her face, which more people should do more often, and repeats the invitation. And then walks away.
Dwight sums it up in a TH: "Jim is my enemy. But it turns out that Jim is also his own worst enemy. And the enemy of my enemy is my friend. So Jim is actually my friend. But, because he is his own worst enemy, the enemy of my friend is my enemy, so actually Jim is my enemy. But--" Where's that flip chart?
In his office, Jim admits to Michael that he should have grabbed him, and he's sorry. He admits that he thought he could have handled the sales call alone. "I may never be as good a salesman as you are, but I at least need a chance to do the job." Michael realizes something: "Jim is jealous of me."
Jim enters the kitchen, and gets some mocking from Meredith and Oscar. "Oscar's a douche," Michael confides to Jim after they leave. Jim appreciates it, but they agree that Oscar's all right. When they're leaving the room, Michael holds the door for Jim, but then pretends like he's going to fall, giving Jim a bit of friendly ribbing himself, where everyone can see. So after showing everyone that he's cool with Jim, suddenly so is everyone else. Which is very cool of Michael.
I'd recap the whole "Male Prima Donna" thing, but let's be serious: if you're reading this, you've already seen it.
Pam asks Erin to fax something for her, Erin is weird about it, and she asks how the sales calls went. Pam calls it a "total waste of time," but then remembers what Andy said about Erin and lies that it was fun spending the day with him. Erin agrees. "He's like the coolest person I've ever met," she says, in all sincerity. "That's... right," Pam says, swallowing what she was about to say, and then compares Andy to Marlon Brando. Erin doesn't know who she's talking about, but she'll go along with saying Andy's as cool as Marlon Wayans. Pam will go along with that, too. I think we all can.
Discuss this episode in our forums, then see why, despite their occasional terribleness, Jim and Pam are perfect for each other.
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 , or just e-mail him at m.giant[at]gmail.com.