Sail Away Without Me

S09E06

In the wake of the recent Bernard family scandal and subsequent cratering of its financial fortunes, Andy comes to the unhappy realization that it's going to be necessary to sell the family yacht. Despite his sudden competence in dealing with the crisis, he takes this pretty hard, as he always wanted to sail it but never got the chance. So to cheer him up, Erin takes him to where it's docked in the last hours before it's sailed off to its new owner in the Bahamas. The plan is for one last sunset sail, but the dock employee won't allow that. So Andy up and decides that he'll sail it to the Caribbean himself.

Oscar takes the documentarians aside and confesses his affair with Angela's husband, unaware until too late that Kevin overheard everything. So now he's in the position of counting on Kevin to keep it secret, a task Kevin finds quite difficult in the face of various comments from Angela. Oscar maneuvers to have Kevin suspended, but thinks better of it and calls it off. And when the Senator shows up at the office and Oscar nearly freaks out, he's certain Kevin's about to spill all the beans. Fortunately, Kevin has a well-timed bout of temporary forgetfulness instead.

Dwight volunteers to be interviewed on a local radio show, but when the guest spot is cancelled, nobody tells him. Instead, Jim, Pam, Darryl, and Nellie conspire to cast him unknowingly in a Dunder-Mifflin version of War of the Worlds, spinning an alternate narrative in real time that begins with accusations of toxic paper and culminates in Dwight talking David Wallace down from what he thinks is an actual hostage crisis. This without Dwight ever getting wise to what's going on, even though he's in his underwear. Again.

Andy does indeed sail away from the dock in the family boat, but his crew is going to be his little brother, playing hooky from rehab and in need of a long cruise to dry out. So Erin's left high and dry. Well, except for how Pete is more than happy to help her fill some time in her suddenly empty social calendar.

Crossing the parking lot, Oscar asks, "Can you guys come with me for a minute?" Who? Oh, he's talking to the documentarians, who follow him behind the building where he confesses his affair with Angela's husband, the senator. "I hope that I can count on your sensitivity, maturity, and discretion," he says into a rolling camera. And then, out from behind a stack of pallets steps Kevin, who has none of those things.

Andy's holed up in his office with a bunch of unfamiliar-looking financial advisers as Jim and Pam bring us up to date: Andy's father blew all of the Bernard family's money and ran away to Argentina with another woman, and his brother Walt, Jr. locked himself in the wine cellar. But they're most horrified with how Andy has been so..."competent." Oh, and speaking of squandered fortunes, Jim and Pam don't seem to be fighting about that $10K he sank into his business venture on Halloween any more. Andy admits in a TH from his office that the "Nards [are] hurting," but he's doing so well at dealing with it that he wishes his dad could see him now. "'Course, he caused this whole mess so fuck him."

In the stairwell, Oscar tells Kevin that he's in love with Robert and he needs Kevin's help keeping it a secret until he can sort it out. "I really want to," Kevin assures him. "Whatever happens, always remember that." Or maybe "assures" isn't the right word.

Pam gets off the phone and reports that a local radio host named Iris Black wants someone from Dunder Mifflin to guest on her show today. This must be the most boring radio show ever. Dwight quickly volunteers, because he thinks it'll make him famous and that being famous will help him sell more paper. Like it does Brad Pitt.

Meredith asks Andy for leads on his brother in rehab, but is disappointed to learn he's in New Mexico. "So how you holding up?" she asks, rallying quickly. "We're done here, Meredith," Andy says with startling competence. Kind of a shame that Josh Groban won't be back, though.

Dwight sits at his desk doing tongue-twisters and vocal warm-ups, preparing for his radio interview but really just irritating everyone.

Andy has Erin, Andy, and Darryl in the conference room going over some unstealable Bernard family assets, including a boat whose sale would cover his mom's expenses. Alas, Andy's not willing to part with it, so he asks for other ideas. Oscar is distracted by Kevin talking to Angela at the copier, and snaps his name from the open door until Kevin remembers himself. Back in the conference room, Daryl's just finished calculating that selling everything but the boat will set Andy's mom up for six months, but Andy still isn't entirely cool with letting go of the floating family heirloom, even though he reluctantly agrees to do so. "What are you going to do, cry about it?" he THs, just before running off-camera to go cry about it.

Pam gets off the phone again to announce that the interview's off, bumped by coverage of a new cupcake shop at the Steamtown Mall. They figure Dwight, who is not currently in the room, will be disappointed. "And you know what?" Jim says. "We cannot let that happen."

Pete finds Erin at Reception trying on silly watermelon-teeth. "This isn't how I would cheer up just anyone," she explains to Pete, but Andy's pretty juvenile. Especially since he became Season Two Michael. Pete points out that Andy's, like, forty, but Erin insists he can't be much past his thirties. So I guess Andy also gets to be Season Seven Gabe.

Dwight's in the break room with a phone, which he's apparently been told is going to serve as the remote studio for the radio show. The phone rings, and because there's no caller ID in this office, Dwight is unaware that it's Pam calling from the conference room pretending to be Iris Black's operator; Nellie using a fake American accent to pretend to be Iris Black herself; Daryl playing the Biz Wiz theme song on his keyboard; and Jim as, I guess, sound engineer. Oh, he's engineering something, all right.

Erin pops into Andy's office with her joke teeth, which don't cheer him up at all. So sad that he's too depressed to even appreciate one of the few people on this show who is still funny at least once a week.

In Accounting, Angela gives Kevin a hard time about forgetting to order more forms and saying nothing he could do could surprise her. Kevin gigglingly begs to differ, until Oscar squeals at him and Kevin rushes off to the bathroom. Which apparently he does a lot anyway, as we learn in a whole montage of Great Moments In Kevin Malone Suddenly Needing To Take A Dump.

Erin invites Andy out for lunch, but he's still upset about the boat, which his dad never let him sail, smacking his hand off the wheel every time he touched it. "Now I'm the man of the family and we're selling the damn thing." Erin asks when it leaves, and upon finding out it'll be tonight, she says to screw lunch and go for a sail instead. Andy scoffs that it's in Stamford, Connecticut and they'd have to leave right now. So that's what they do.

Dwight is claiming to "Iris" that he's the real power in the company when Jim holds up a note for her. Still using her American accent, Nellie tells him they're picking up a clinking sound, so Dwight's going to have to lose his shirt to keep the buttons from rattling. They giggle as they listen to Dwight strip to his wife-beater, and then when he tries to get back on topic, Jim holds up a second note reading "Now pants!" What's with Jim wanting to get Dwight in his underwear lately?

By M. Giant

Angela gets off the phone talking about how exhausted her husband is from the campaign: "Last night he was so tired he just wanted a little Mexican brought in." This is too much for Kevin, who runs away laughing. Oscar, in a TH: "I'm in big trouble." Kevin, in a TH: "Yeah, Oscar's in big trouble." But Oscar seems to have gotten hold of Kevin's personnel file, so maybe Kevin's in trouble too.

Now in his underwear, Dwight fields a question from "Iris" about Dunder Mifflin paper being toxic, which he denounces in an aside as "Gotcha journalism. Well, they are not going to gotch me."

Oscar is showing something damning from Kevin's file to Toby, who says he'll need to send Kevin home pending an investigation. Not cool, Oscar. You know how Toby loves his investigations.

Dwight's getting exercised about "Iris's" accusations, and while Jim hurries out of the room for some reason, Nellie drafts Pam to act as a paper mill foreman from upstate New York. Pam obligingly busts out a harsh Long Island accent as she says their paper's only toxic if it's exposed to oxygen. Jim rushes into the break room in a fake panic, grabbing Dwight and shaking him as he berates him about their plummeting stock prices before ducking back out. "Iris" closes in for the kill, as Dwight fights his own actual panic.

Kevin happily gets off the phone after a summons from Toby, speculating that maybe he's getting a promotion. Oscar says he hopes that's what it is, and Kevin agrees, saying that then he could get his own office and not blow Oscar's secret. "I've been really worried about that." Oscar is left looking guilty, as he should. Kevin's not the one screwing his coworker's husband, after all.

Andy and Erin get to the marina and see the Bernard yacht, which Erin loves at first sight. "So this is how your family came to America," she says. It's kind of a nice moment, except a dock employee is there trying to rig the boat for departure, and he's a big rude jerkwad. Andy shows off his old job of raising the mainsail, and the rigger's rude some more, even slapping Andy's hand off the capstan repeatedly. Andy finally snaps at him, "Dammit, screw you, dad!" Whoa.

Later, Andy and Erin are having a sad little picnic belowdecks, which is just not doing it for him. "Erin says he never had to sail the boat to be a man, and she considers him the captain as long as they're here. Which he takes to heart and says to the rigger, "Hey, Charm School. I'm taking over from here." In fact, he's just decided on the spot to sail it to the Bahamas himself, screwing his deposit and paying for the supplies, and adding, 'How much for that cool fisherman's sweater?"

The fake Biz Wiz is starting to get pretty War of the Worlds, as Nellie is "narrating" a police standoff in real time at David Wallace's house. Jim steps in as the Greenwich police chief, offending Darryl with his "black guy" voice. Dwight offers to conference in Wallace right now, despite the radio crew's suddenly panicked objections.

Erin wonders if Andy knows what he's doing, and he insists he does. "I also know where the booze stash is," he says, opening the door to reveal his little brother crashed out on a bunk. Hey, there's Josh Groban after all. Andy is not entirely wrong about the location of the booze, stash, though; as long as Walt, Jr. stays inside that room, that's where the liquor is. "I figured I'd get that first relapse out of the way," Walt Jr. says. Andy tells his brother that he decided to sail to Bermuda (Erin quickly corrects that it's the Bahamas), and Walt, Jr. should be his crew. He could use the time to dry out anyway. Awesome, DTs on the high seas.

Dwight gets the real David Wallace on the line and is extravagantly relieved to hear that he's okay, and tells Wallace that he believes in him to make the right choice. The people in the conference room listen nervously as Dwight tells Wallace in a negotiator-voice to let the mailman go. "Walk out of the house with your hands on top of your head...Dunder Mifflin will be in good hands while you're away in prison." Wallace just tells Dwight not to call him on his cell any more, which is probably the only reasonable response.

By M. Giant

When Dwight emerges from the break room, not having bothered to get dressed first, he's met with a round of applause from the bullpen. They cheer his fake triumph through the fake crisis, and Dwight cheerfully THs that his first radio interview went pretty much as expected. That part, I agree with.

Kevin returns to Accounting and says Toby just wanted to update his personal information. Angela asks acidly why Kevin would ever think he'd be getting a promotion, and Kevin starts to answer heatedly, only to stop shocked in midsentence as the senator himself walks in. He tells Angela that he sensed someone he loved needed his attention, and adds that Oscar's looking good. "Getting lots of vigorous exercise?" he asks, as Oscar recoils from the hand on his shoulder as though burned. Angela asks what's up, and Oscar says he overreacted because he's stressed out, but flounders helplessly at why that might be. Kevin jumps in and firmly says we all know what's going on: "Senator Lipton has a big election week. We all need to give him our support." And he leads the bullpen's second round of applause of the day, as well as a chant of "USA!" Oscar THs that he's impressed with Kevin's self-control. But then Kevin THs, "I totally forgot about the affair for a minute!" and then dissolves in laughter, saying, "Oscar is having sex with the senator and Angela doesn't even know! Her life is a complete sham!"

By M. Giant

Andy and Walt, Jr. are ready to cast off, and Andy thanks Erin, who's apparently staying home. "You did this!" Dammit, I'm happy!" After he sails off in the Aspire II, telling her that he'll see her in three weeks, Erin THs that she's pleased she could help. Would she have gone with him had he asked? "On his sailboat cruise to the Caribbean? Yes, I think that would have been really fun and romantic." And they're not even out of earshot before Andy blows her off, because Walt, Jr. found a guitar on board and is playing the opening chords to "More Than Words," which is probably the sweetest-sounding "shut up and fuck me" song ever written. Think David Wallace will be as cool as Erin is about Andy bugging out again? And do you suppose Andy remembered to put a restraining bolt on Nellie before he left?

Erin returns to the office, where Pete has been covering the phones. He yields the Reception chair to her and invites her out to Poor Richard's after work for beer and pool with some buddies, including a guy named Flipper. So named, it turns out, because he once flipped a table while drunk. "He sounds like an idiot," Erin says, but since it's not like she's got anything better to do, she follows Pete out of the office. At least someone's inviting her somewhere.

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.