…and apparently working in the Scranton branch again (Michael asks his boss if he can fire him, the boss says “not without cause”)

I also have a couple of rumored, but well-sourced mini-spoilers:

1. Angela is going to find out at some point this season that she’s pregant.

2. The actor playing Ryan got a role in some Tarrantiono film so he’ll be gone for much of the season, maybe for good.

throw things down there."

I love everything Creed has ever said.

that’s where I stash the chandelier

…Pam loved the house. ….And how about that basil salad? – TL

the five words that killed the office

i expect this kind of child-like consumerism from michael, but not pam

jim’s decision to buy his house… where do you even begin? its laughably lame

pam= horrible female stereotype at this point and not much else

and i think if you went back and read my comments over the last year + on the show it woul dbe born out:

i just ever adjusted to Pam & Jim getting together, and fundamentally can’t accept it as part of the show’s DNA…

the less of them the better, the tendency to end shows with the PB& J storyline is killing me

its not funny, its not interesting

the writers showed in this episode what Pam thinks of herself as well as what she really is.

She likes to think she is ‘above’ the messiness of the microwave, and posts a quite snobby note telling others to clean it up. Incredibly self-righteous of her.

But then, when Jim buys his old parent’s house which is obviously in terrible shape, she says she loves it out of love, most likely.

Essentially, she is becoming that sort of person she called out earlier through the microwave scenes, simply settling (whether in a rather shitty house or with a dirty microwave) instead of doing something about it.

Maybe I trust the writers too much, though. Maybe they really do want a sappy love story straight out of Disney’s playbook. But hopefully not.

this is all speculation, but here are some thoughts. I’ll make it short.

The “obvious” thing that I (and I suspect others) were suspecting (assuming the “Disney” path just can’t be real — big assumption, I suppose) was that Pam would come back to Scranton and be discontent and that would make for problems.

But watching the episode again, particulary after reading rockchalks comments on Pam really being a “settler” at heart rather than the “cool artist” she set out to be.

Indeed, while I imagine Jim will never work his way into RR’s heart again, it was interesting to see his renewed lack of confidence when talking to the camera about the house — the obviously forced optimism and concern about what Pam would think. Of course, it turned out that “she loves it” that Jim bought a house for her.

But what struck me, seeing Jim off-balance early in the episode, and then when listening to Pam rant about the microwave (anyone else think that Jim did it, and that it perhaps might come up again? Or are they just going to let it be irrelevant [probably]?) he’s definitely… getting a different perspective.

Think about it — it’s Jim who has to tell Pam she should stay in New York and “come back the right way.” It’s Pam who decides to stay. It’s Jim who’s clearly not sure about the house, it’s Pam who loves it.

But when did Jim “fall” for Pam? When she had “dreams” that she talked about but won’t/can’t realize. Jim is like this, too, of course, but the difference is that he ends up being less happy (passing up the job in Baltimore, the Second Life character, and so on), while Pam seems increasingly content to be a receptionist in Scranton.

I’m not saying the episode was great — it may have been the worst one I’ve seen. It seemed so incoherent. But if you think along the Jim/Michael/Ryan axis that’s been throughout the show (less so with Ryan, but it’s definitely there), one can make a bit of sense out of it. Michael is, of course, tremendously “uncool” with his irrational (if hilairious) hatred of Toby, who is also bizarrely content and passive to the point that one can only assume it sets off some tick in Michael — he can’t accept Toby’s acceptance of him. Ryan is the “cool” (sarcasm quotes) asshole who predictably wants what he can have, but ultimately does what he wants in a way that Jim should do (although Ryan scarcely does so in a commendable way, to say the least) and just takes off instead of being trapped.

Jim typically finds a medium, but the wrong one. He does “get the girl” he wants, but not on the terms he hopes for, and she’s not turning out the be the woman he was attracted to. Pam talks about getting out of Scranton, but always comes back. Jim always comes back to Scranton and tries to talk himself into the house being a good idea, but is obviously unconvinced and wants out — but he keeps letting himself get pulled back in.

Anyway, it’s just speculation on what the heck was going on with the episode. It just came to me and I wanted to get it down before it slipped away… sorry for the babbling.

Anyway, I got sucked into Harry Potter, too, and thought the seventh book would reveal a more interesting “deep structure.” But no, instead of Gutierrez, Rowling traded for Jacobs instead. Hopefully The Office writers aren’t penning a Jose Guillen contract.

I’m not sure which season this was from. In this episode, Pam was offered an internship in graphic design through Dunder Mifflin, which could be done on the weekends, plus one week in New York. She was excited about it, but then decided against it after her finace Roy shot it down. There were two interesting things in that episode:

1. Jim and Pam talk about this internship. She says she won’t be doing it. Jim tells her she definitely should. Jim says something like, “What, do you want to be a receptionist here for the rest of your life?” He is clearly implying that is a bad thing. Her response is defensive, but obviously conflicted.

2. In another part of the episode, she talks about the kind of house she wants to live in, with a terrace garden on the second floor. Later in the episode, she’s doing one of those to-the-camera interview things and starts to talk about how there are none of those kinds of houses in Scranton, so she won’t ever get her dream house and she starts to cry.

Pam’s part of the episode was entirely about the fact that she has these dreams (an art career, a nice house, getting the hell out of Scranton) and that she’ll never live out these dreams as long as she’s on her current career path and with Roy. Fast forward to the present. She has eschewed both New York and an art career. She has locked her self into being a receptionist at Dunder-Mifflin, marrying Jim and living in a boring little house in Scranton. Are the writers going to deal with what appears to be an inherent problem in the Jim/Pam relationship, or are they going to act like everything is fine?