Jury Duty

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And I'm Angela Kinsey.

We were on the office together.

And we're best friends.

And now we're doing the ultimate office rewatch podcast just for you.

Each week, we will break down an episode of The Office and give exclusive behind-the-scenes stories that only two people who were there can tell you.

We're the office ladies.

Hey there, how are you?

I'm good.

How are you? I'm sluggish you are. I think it's the heat.

Well, it's very hot.

It's very hot.

I'm wearing one of those dresses that doesn't touch you anywhere. Yeah, it's so hot, it's too hot.

I'm wearing flip-flops, I never do that when we record.

Oh, I wear them all the time. Oh, you do.

When we record, yeah.

Look at my feet right now.

Oh yeah.

There you go.

I am wearing these like black, what would you call them?

They're like the big leg pants.

Well, these are like my find of the year. A mom friend of mine. She's French. No, she has the cutest pants all the time. Of course, she's French.

You're billowy, I'm in a big, flowy dress from Tarragot.

Okay.

Okay, now, tarjay, tarjay.

It's also French.

It's French now that we've got that out of the way. What are we talking about today?

I loved this episode, I loved it so much.

Oh my gosh, I was so excited for these storylines.

Is it any surprise that we loved this episode? Now that our characters finally have stories again? Could that be part of it? That could, maybe it's because our characters make it better.

Well, we have it on very good authority from the writer's room.

That's right, yes, Steve Healy said. Episodes are better.

More Pam and Angela.

PAM and ANGELa, It's official, and this episode proves it. We're talking about jury duty.

We finally got there.

It's season eight, episode 13, written by Erin Scherr, who we love.

Love.

And directed by Eric Appel. Here is your summary. Jim is back from jury duty, or is he? Hmm.

Eric was fantastic.

I think I know which one.

I think you do.

Because I loved it. Eric has been nominated for and won several awards for his work. According to his IMDB page, under the Trivia section, Eric can tri-fold his tongue.

What?

This is also sometimes referred to as a cloverleaf tongue. What is a tri-fold tongue? I had to google it.

I don't understand, is that where you make it look like a flower kind of thing? Well, you tell me?

I think it looks like a W, like you're making a W with your tongue. While googling what it was, I found out that Daniel Radcliffe can also do this, and here Daniel Radcliffe did it once on a red carpet, there's Daniel Radcliffe's tri-fold tongue.

Wow.

Yeah.

That's impressive.

I know, okay.

Well.

According to an article on Colgate.

Can anyone here Sam Cassie?

Anyone tri-fold your tongue, I cannot.

Cassie can't, Jenna clearly can't. She had to google it.

Hold on, Cassie's looking it up to see if she can. It looks like a W. It really looks like a W. Can you make a W with your tongue?

I can do the canoe thing with my tongue.

I can do the canoe fold and I can also fold my tongue in half like this.

Oh my God, that makes the grossest sound.

Oh no, well, it keeps popping up. It was really gross. So sorry everyone.

I had no idea we were going here this morning. Well, you never know. Listen, you know what?

It's where my research took us.

I love it.

Would you like Fast Fact number two? I can't wait. Fast Fact number two is a fan question from Tracy W. in Norway. Jenna and Angela, I'm curious if you have ever had any interesting real life personal experiences being summoned for jury duty?

Tracy I almost always get selected to be on a jury. I mean, every time I go in there, they're like, little blonde lady, get up here. I don't know why, but yes, I have many stories of jury duty. I think I've already shared one.

Yeah, back when Toby had jury duty.

Right, that was when I was a juror on a bait car case. But guess what I found in my digital clutter and I didn't even know you had this question. What? I wrote you an email from one of the many times I was waiting to be picked for a jury, and I found it.

I love this.

This is from October 2018.

That's right, you're not allowed to do that in the courthouse.

Yeah, but in that holding room, you can. Okay, here's what I emailed you, Hey Lady, Day two.

Oh my god, Angela, you brought cheese to jury duty.

And townhouse crackers? It's so you and I took a selfie and you see me holding like a ziploc of crackers.

That is incredible. All right, I have a crazy story. Okay, I was on jury duty the week we were prepping this episode to record.

I was on jury duty, that is crazy, but it was a mistake.

What do you mean? So how? What? Okay, so I was supposed to do jury duty.

Yeah.

And I broke my shoulder and I couldn't drive, I couldn't go, yeah, so I postponed it, sure.

You log in with your juror ID number.

Yes, and so I go to the portal and it says, you can't postpone anymore. You had to do that by the Friday before. Yeah, but it also said you don't have to report tomorrow Monday.

So you just rolled the dice you had to, I did.

I rolled the dice. Every night at 7 p..m. I would log into my jury portal and every night it said you don't have to report, and then on Thursday night it said you've completed your jury duty.

Oh my gosh amazing.

I completed it by mistake. How lucky was I?

Very lucky, I mean, considering everything, you were like single parenting.

Yes.

I will say, anyone that knows our mom, Detective Hearts, knows that we would actually be thrilled to get picked under different circumstances.

Yeah, I've reported many times and I've never been selected.

Oh, I always get selected and I get very excited.

That tracks.

Yeah, and I bring a notepad and a pen, so people know I'm serious.

Maybe that's why you're getting picked, I don't know. Well. Those are our jury duty stories, moving us now to Fast Fact 3. I titled it Pam is Back.

Yes.

PaM is back, Pam is back.

Everyone, I did this episode five weeks after having a C-section. I did that because actors do not get paid maternity leave.

That is true.

We go on unpaid disability, which means your employer can't fire you, but they do not have to pay you.

Yep.

So every time I missed an episode, I missed a paycheck.

That's right.

I wrote about it in our book.

Yeah.

We got a lot of mail about this, people who had read our book and were surprised to learn about this. Mm-hmm. We got a fan question from Kathleen M in North Carolina, who said in your book, The office BFFs. Jenna shared about how hard it was for her to return and film this episode after having her baby, and how supportive everyone was.

Yeah, yeah.

I was still working with a lactation consultant, trying to get my son to nurse well. I was very worried about messing up his feeding schedule. At the same time, coming back to work meant that I got to see all of these people who just loved me so much, the cast and the crew. And I'd been very isolated at home. Parents know this when you have a new baby.

I remember loving having friends that had a big time difference, who were already awake, you know, my friends on the East Coast. Because I would be up at like 4 a.m.

Yeah.

And I knew I could call and just kind of talk to them while I breastfed.

Well, the part of getting to see people I loved that, that was good for my soul because I'd been very like in a cocoon, you know? And then when we started filming, my adrenaline really kicked in. It was almost dreamlike. I don't have any real memories that when I watched that scene, I feel like I dreamed it.

Yeah.

So for this episode, he came to work with me, he had our son in my trailer with him so that I could nurse him. Because, like I said, I was still trying to get that down. So that was really helpful. And I would have to shout out our first ad, Kelly Cantlie, because she was instrumental in making that happen.

Yeah.

Because I was like, got it, I got what she was saying to me, you know?

Yeah, yeah.

And I would like to say, Alexis, thank you for saying I looked amazing. I think every postpartum mom out there knows what that was like for me. I felt very vulnerable.

Yeah.

When I got to work that day, Alicia, our costume designer, showed me some clothes, I put something on. She said. We're done. I'm not going to make you change over and over again.

Right?

The hair and makeup folks were amazing. Kim Ferry put my hair in a ponytail. She was like, This is easy, I believe this.

You know what I've never shared?

What?

So I went back to work. I was almost seven weeks. I did not plan this, but I had my baby a week before we went on summer hiatus.

It was not planned.

It just worked out like that, so I had a little extra time there. But I went back and my first week back, we had a whole cast photo shoot.

Oh, wow.

Yes.

Where we take all the publicity photos.

Yes, when we go to things, sometimes people have stuff for us to sign. People will bring that photo. Every time I sign it. I think I had just pumped.

Oh my gosh, yeah, now this photo is going to live forever.

I was like, Anyway, it's just kind of a crazy thing to do when you go back to work after giving birth.

Listen, we got a lot of mail on this subject and a lot of people just asking me, How did you do this? I did it because the women on the set showed up for me, they made it possible for me to come and get my paychecks. And that's what women do for one another all the time.

We sure do.

They could have made a hiatus here, we'd done it in the past.

The suits could have made it happen.

The suits could have made a hiatus for my maternity leave. We'd made hiatuses for people to do movies before.

They had.

But they didn't, and so, you know, I went on unpaid disability, but the women in our casting crew, they filled in that gap. And that's why I was able to come back to work and get paid. And I will be forever grateful.

Yeah.

We do that all the time for one another. I know every woman out there has a story about.

A woman that stood in for her, yeah, lifted her up, supported her, yeah.

So thank you to Kelly and the hair and makeup women, and Alicia in wardrobe, and just you Angela. You guys were great. And listen, the other casting crew were amazing as well.

But did they guard your door when you went in to pump?

No, it was only you, that's right.

All right, well, let's take a quick break, because when we come back, somebody's got to cut loose.

Footloose. I loved this.

And I have a backstory about why the scene happened.

Oh my gosh, I can't wait.

Well, I want you guys to know there was a deleted scene that would have started this episode totally differently. And given the backstory, why Andy comes barreling through that warehouse door, Okay, it was a montage of Andy's morning. He pulls into the parking lot and he spills coffee on his pants leg as he gets out of his car. Okay?

Can I say something?

Yeah.

This is why you put your milk into the coffee cup before the coffee.

Oh.

Because then you can see the milk, mm-hmm, and also you don't need a spoon. It mixes while you put the coffee in. Oh my gosh.

This is a coffee drinker's hack I didn't know about, yeah.

Put the milk in first, you'll get the level, you'll know, okay, all right.

Go ahead. Well, Andy didn't do that.

No, now he's ruined his coffee.

Now he's super bummed because his first cup of coffee he spilled on his pants leg. The second cup is now full of this chunky milk. Mm-hmm. Then he goes to get another cup of coffee, he goes over to the coffee pot.

Oh, I thought it spilled.

Empty, either a bad who puts things back in the freezer. empty. I'll tell you who my teenagers.

After a morning like that, I would need to blow off steam with a mega dance.

You might need to mega dance. yeah, you might need to dance on some of those little bubble poppet thingies.

Well, Andy is going to put Footloose on the boom box, mm-hmm, and he is going to do an epic dance montage. Did you know that the original song in the script was not Footloose?

What was it?

It was last resort by Papa Roach. Oh, I don't know. We ended up using Footloose. It cost $45,000..

Woo.

I know, wow, that's a dance.

Well, you know, Andy dancing to Footloose made me think of that game. Six degrees of Kevin Bacon.

Oh yeah.

Okay, you guys know this, right? The theory is that anyone can be linked through their film or TV roles. Back to Kevin Bacon within six steps. Okay, lady, guess what, what?

We are.

Yes, because Steve Carell and Kevin Bacon were both in crazy, stupid, love. Wow, two degrees.

And then us, wouldn't that be one degree, one degree?

Wait, you don't count Kevin Bacon, I just realized.

Yeah, we're one degree from.

We're one degree.

We basically know him.

We basically know him, I've never met him.

I have not met him.

I don't think I know I would remember meeting Kevin Bacon. Kevin Bacon, we're one degree.

I feel like we could invite him over because we're one degree.

Like to our house, I don't know, like to barbecue.

Yeah.

I feel like we could.

Can we just say, Hey, you worked with someone we know? Oh my gosh.

We got a fan question about this cold open mm-hmm from Haley B in Oklahoma, who said, Did Ed get to just have fun and do his own thing? Or was this all scripted well? Steve Burgess said he does not have any choreographer on the schedule for this week.

About the bubble wrap.

Yes, it included the tap dancing on large bubble wrap. Also, Andy skateboards on the push cart, huh? and Andy takes a large bag of shredded paper and makes it snow while laughing giddily.

When I watched it, I really wish that I could run on that bubble wrap that looked like fun to me.

I really wanted to dance on the paper confetti.

Hmm.

I was super jealous when I watched this, I was like, I really wish this had been Michael's opening.

That's a fun day.

It seemed amazing. Well, this episode opens with Jim returning back to the office from jury duty. Everybody's very happy to see him. Yeah, they kind of want to know, like, how'd it go?

I was so intrigued by this. Why would Jim pick hit and run, I don't know.

Because that feels like something that might have lasted a week. Yeah, feels like a five-day trial.

Yeah, I mean, I guess you either did it or you didn't.

Yeah, but you got to present all the evidence.

Yeah, well, I was curious about, is this maybe something the writers knew about, like, hit and run cases? And this is what I found? In Pennsylvania, particularly in Philadelphia, hit and run accidents happen at an alarming rate, really.

I was in a hit and run.

There you go.

I was the hit and somebody ran. I was in like a line of cars and somebody hit me. And then I hit the person in front of me. Because, you know, they propelled me into them. Yeah, and we got out of our cars for a second and then we signaled that we were all going to turn the corner to get off the main road, so me and the person in front of me, we turned the corner to get off the main road and then the hitter just took off.

Wow.

Just drove away.

Yeah, yeah, it's very common. So maybe that's why the writers were like, Oh, this is an easy fit.

I was confirming.

You're confirming. Did you know that? You can get up to a year in prison or a fine up to $2,500, depending on the damage caused to the property? In a hit and run.

I do now.

There you go, it gets worse if the hit and run was worse, you know, the penalties.

The severity increases, that's right with the severity.

Severity.

Common.

Common.

Well, Jim has a talking head where he says that he was called into jury duty, but they released him around noon. He didn't see any point in going back to work for just a half day, so he, you know, stayed home that day. Helped Pam.

Yeah, I loved that, I did, too.

I love that talking head.

I also thought John did such a great job, his look at the end was so good.

So Ann, you looked up the statistics of hit and runs. I looked up the statistics for how likely it is that you'll get picked for a jury.

How likely, because I seem to get picked every time.

I know so, according to the National Center for State Courts.

How do I continue to fall into the 19%?

I don't know, but I mean, that's pretty high, one in five, basically, chance of getting on a jury if you report.

Yeah.

So yeah, we're handing out a lot of stats today.

I know we're stat heavy. do I have any more stats coming up? Papers, papers?

Let's see.

Papers I don't have any more stats.

I don't have any more stats, the stats are over.

I have lots of scripty stuff. Okay, okay.

No more stats.

No more stats. But the other thing that's going to happen in this scene is that Erin is going to get like an email ding and she's like, Oh, Angela had her baby.

Yes, everyone's so excited.

Yeah, everyone's so excited. In the shooting draft, the scene was longer. And Oscar also gets the email, like a bunch of people, the emails popping up around the office.

Okay.

And Oscar reads what the email said out loud Oh yeah, here's what he says to the group. It says that at 6.14 a..m, Angela Martin Lipton gave birth to Philip Halstead Lipton, a five-pound, three-ounce baby boy.

They should have left this in because that really sets up the scene later.

Right, the preemie? Mm-hmm. Well, the accounting department is going to go see Angela. I mean, they're kind of like a little family they are.

Oscar's the dad, Kevin is Oscar's dad, and Angela is Kevin's mom. Mm-hmm. that's how Kevin breaks it down, yeah.

Gabe says he wants to go, too. Apparently he loves maternity wards.

Yes, he says, they're the perfect blend of love and horror.

Great.

We did have a fan catch from Afrin R in San Antonio who said, We know. Gabe has weird fears, like his fear of cockroaches and getting squeamish around babies. But I guess he got over his fear of babies. Because here, he says, he loves going to maternity wards. Is this a continuity error or did he get over this fear? Well, Afrin, I don't think he got over his fear. I think he's doing that thing where he's like walking into the spooky, fun house.

Well, I think he's drawn to the process of the babies coming into the world. hmm, labor. I think he's drawn to labor, really.

Oh, that's such a good line.

Isn't that perfect?

That's so well written.

Next up.

We're in the break room and Andy is asking Jim for more deets on his case. Everybody wants to hear more deets.

Everyone's so excited, entertaining, new information, yes, new thing to talk about.

Everyone says, Listen, you kind of owe us like we covered you all week.

Yeah.

People start explaining things that happened.

Phyllis got her car smashed visiting one of Jim's clients.

Yeah, the least he can do is tell them the story of the case.

Yeah.

So Jim starts laying it out, he's using napkins and salt and pepper shakers. Then Toby says, Ugh, you know what? My favorite part of jury duty was? I loved the empanadas from Ernesto.

And Jim's like, Yeah, I love that restaurant too, and Toby goes, Mm Don't you mean food truck? Oh, Dwight, Dwight, this is it.

Dwight's ears go up.

To prove that Jim is lying.

Dwight would make a very good mom detective. This whole episode is just Dwight being a mom detective, honestly, yeah, right.

And he doesn't really solve the crime that no one cared about. It's perfect.

He did it.

Well, I think Oscar is so brilliant in this episode, I actually just saw him. We had lunch and I was like, Oscar. When you gather everyone around before you walk into the hospital room and you're like, Listen, I don't know if you've ever seen a preemie baby. It can be very shocking. Do not comment on it.

I loved him in this scene.

He's so good and then they go in and see the biggest baby ever.

I'll have you know that this hospital was not a real hospital. Angela, as you know, you were there. This was a set that we built over on our warehouse stages. Yep.

Yeah, it was great because we could walk back to our trailers. I loved it well, right away. Angela doesn't look happy to see any of her co-workers. I think Phyllis was right.

Kevin immediately remarks on how fat the baby is. And Oscar's like, What are you doing? And he's like, what you said? Don't talk about it. If it's small, you didn't say anything about it being giant.

A big, giant, fat baby, the senator calls Philip substantial, and Aaron says, He's more than that. He's a monster. I'm sorry, this baby is adorable.

So cute. In fact, I know who played Little Philip Halstead Lipton, he was played by twins Allie and Suzanne Hartman. So you're actually holding a little baby girls right there.

Yeah, they were very sweet babies, they were so good.

Well, just in case there was also a backup baby. Haley Escalante. You know, that's how they do it, they cast the twins, the twin babies, but there's always a backup baby.

Yeah, remember that episode?

When Pam brings her baby to Gabe's apartment, you know, and Dwight has to like, soothe the baby. And everybody was like, Why is this baby look completely different? We had to use a backup baby.

Backup.

Yeah, because the other babies were like, very awake, they wouldn't sleep. We needed a baby that was a sleeper.

These babies were just the cutest. And I remember the mom was just standing right off camera there. Mm-hmm. And I remember talking to her and just how sweet she was. And she was a fan of the show.

Well, you were very real in these scenes like this is something I noticed you were always adjusting your bra.

My nursing bra.

Yeah, like all of your movements, all of the ways you regarded the baby, it was so clear that you were a mom. I mean, if you go back and you look at when Pam had her first baby in the hospital, I watched those scenes. And I'm like, I've clearly never had a baby before, but you? It was so real, it took me back to being in your hospital room.

Except I did not have a fully blown out hairdo that had been flat ironed and makeup. You did a side by side of what I look like in the hospital room and what Angela Martin looked like. That did crack me up because I remember you saying. They put such thought into how Pam would look after having a baby. And her hair sort of in this tousled kind of ponytail, and I look fully made up.

But that tracks for me, for Angela Martin, I don't know, I believe she brought her little makeup bag.

And a flat iron to the hospital. I do, too. I think she was like to the senator, I'm going to do my hair, and he was probably like, great.

Yeah.

Well, let's take a break, because when we get back, we're going to learn what our Dwight's rights are.

Yes, I like it.

Oh, 10 years, 10. It's an old ripped awning, part of it has mildewed, it's so old and gross.

It's coming down today, everybody, it is coming down at 7.30 this morning. I received a video from Angela of the guys who are taking this down. Finally, yeah.

Why has she not taken it down earlier?

It's because it created.

A domino effect?

You're like, if I take it down, what am I putting up? I want to expand the back porch, I don't want to get a new shade that's too short, that'll be dumb.

Yeah, it was a whole thing. I couldn't take it down until I knew what I was going to do and save some money and got some ideas because it was a whole thing.

You can't just take down the shade.

Because I have, like, a.

Yes.

So I knew when I took the shade down, I wanted to do a proper porch. I'm very excited.

It's finally happening, it's finally happening.

I mean, I almost cried.

When you sent me the video, I was like.

I can't believe it, she's never gonna leave me.

Another message about the shade It's gone. Oh my gosh. I know I needed it to be part of this podcast so that we could record for all time.

The awning is finally coming off. Listen, while I've been here, I've been getting updates from my husband. Look at this one I'm gonna show you.

Oh my gosh, it is, it's half down.

It's half down.

Well, not that awning, not that awning. It's a wonderful, beautiful day.

Oh man.

What will take its place, I wonder?

What that I griped to you about? Yeah.

Well, what is gripe number two? There isn't even anything that comes to mind. What do I do with all that?

Extra time, I don't know, I'll have to leave you positive affirmations.

Okay, well, back to the episode. Dwight is asking Jim to go over the details of the case again. He's like, I don't understand how it worked.

Yeah.

So he repeats back to Jim, He's like, So there was a guy and he's on his bicycle.

And Jim's like, Yeah.

And Dwight's like, Aha, you never said there was a bicycle?

And he's like, I knew it.

I gotcha.

This is gonna open up a whole can of worms. Because now Dwight has decided to make a citizen's arrest of Jim, instead of reading him his Miranda rights, Dwight's gonna say. You have the right to remain silent, you have the right to beg for mercy, You have the right to request judgment by combat Dwight's rights.

I love judgment by combat, I know.

I did, too. And he tells Dwight to take a chill pill, and literally, like, he's a first grade teacher. He hands Dwight a make-believe glass of water and a make-believe pill, and he's like.

We had a fan catch from Brandon in Illinois who said I have always loved the added detail of how Dwight crumples up the fake cup when he's swallowing.

His chill pill, yeah.

That was a moment for me when I saw that, I was like, that is something we all learn to do in acting class. You had to, you know?

Personalize the moment.

Yes, exactly.

Ground it, yeah.

His acting classes just paid off. In that moment, he made it very specific. Well, Dwight takes the chill pill, he's very chill now.

He's very chill, but he does very calmly say, Andy, if Jim lied, will you fire him? and Andy says, Yes.

Mm-hmm.

Oh, no.

Well, Jim is going to come clean to Andy.

Yeah.

They go into the stairwell, so many confessions have happened in this stairwell, it's where everyone goes for their heart-to-hearts. I know it's very cute.

I had a few heart-to-hearts in the stairwell.

I had a big heart-to-heart in that stairwell. Yeah, like, for real, for real.

I'm saying, for real, yeah. It kind of was funny that in episodes that were written, the characters had heart-to-hearts there, but actually in real life, we did too. Mm-hmm, Jim is going to tell Andy, Look, I'm sorry.

Yeah, Jim says, I should tell everybody, and Andy's like, No, no, no, no, no, no, this will be just between us.

Yeah, because he doesn't want to, like, have to fire him, yeah.

He's like, I got your back.

He's like, Have you ever heard of a Connecticut cover-up? Jim says, No, Andy says. Do you want to know why you never heard of it? Jim says No, covered it up.

That's a very funny couplet. I looked up Connecticut cover-up.

I did, too.

It's in the urban dictionary attributed to the office, right? yeah.

Yeah, I actually texted Warren about it because he's from Connecticut, and I was like, Warren, was this you? In the writer's room? He said. I can't take credit for it, but it feels like something I might have pitched.

Well, Dwight has done something he has hired Ernesto's food truck to come to the office. Yeah.

Empanadas for everybody.

I asked Steve Burgess about that food truck, He said That was a rental from Studio Picture Vehicles. It really didn't make any food.

We didn't get any empanadas, no.

I wondered.

Well, immediately, Ernesto sees Toby. He's like Toby.

Yes.

And then Jim walks out and Dwight's like, Jim, who's that? And Ernesto had no idea who he was.

And Jim had no idea, yeah.

Clearly, until Toby's like, that's Ernesto, and Dwight's like, damn it, but he has a line that cracked me up, he's like, Okay, he remembers Toby, the most forgettable man in the known world.

I know. Guest star Alert Ernesto is played by Eduardo Antonio Garcia. You might recognize him from no country for old men, for which he won a SAG award or law order, L.A.

That's amazing, yeah. This scene has another one of my favorite lines in the episode.

Okay.

Creed says Usually I'm a burrito guy, but if you won't tell, I won't wink wink, like, what? I just picture our writer's room just coming up with these non-sequitur like one-liners for Creed constantly.

See, this is why I'm not a writer, because I would just write the plot. Yes, there would be no of these little like awesome pops of flavor from different characters, all my characters would sound the same.

Yeah.

But I don't know how to do all that other stuff. It's so cool. This is why we were.

Such a good team writing our book because I would write something and you'd be like, Ange, this is really funny. This is a great memory. Where does it go?

And I'm like, I don't know.

And then you'd be like, Okay, here's some structure, and then you would write something and I'd be like, Jenna, this is great. I'm gonna give it, I'm gonna give it a little bit of zhush.

Yeah, you're like, we need some jokes in here. I am in awe of writers. It's no wonder that's who I would always fall in love with. I always fall in love with the writers my whole life. Going back to college, going back to high school.

We fall in love with the things that we feel missing in ourselves.

I think you're right, Ange. Things are falling apart for Andy and Jim. It's becoming very clear How is Andy going to keep this going? We got a fan question from Greg S.

They are such a horrible, lying duo.

The two of them.

Are so bad. Now. It's escalated to this story where Andy, who lives by the courthouse, would drive every morning and get Jim and bring him back to the courthouse. And watch his cute tushy walk into those steps. It's become like a nightmare for them. There was a Dwight talking head here that didn't make it into the episode, but I want to read it to you.

Okay.

Oh my gosh, Dwight says. I have a recurring nightmare that I've been wrongly accused of a crime and 12 of these idiots are on the jury. Stanley is fast asleep, Kevin eats the evidence. Phyllis name is allison, but it really is Phyllis.

That went places I wasn't expecting.

I know, and I had to wonder, too, if somewhere embedded in there was a little shout out to the fact that Allison and Phyllis worked together.

Oh, yes, Allison Jones. Yep.

Hmm.

Well.

Should we go back to the hospital?

Yeah, because Erin is holding baby Phillip. And she says, you know, I think Phillip might be more than five pounds because he's been. And she says, that's the weight that I squat with, and the senator just says, Oh, he's nine pounds.

Yes, and Angela's like, Oh, I don't, well.

Hmm.

I don't remember.

Well, Angela makes up an excuse for remembering it wrong. You know, she was on so many drugs.

Yeah, she might as well have been at a James Taylor concert. Well, now Oscar and Kevin are going to give Angela some gifts that they brought for baby Phillip.

Mm-hmm.

We got a fan question from Kelly T in Indiana, who says when Oscar gives Angela the present at the hospital, it is in the classic movie present box. A wrapped box and a wrapped lid that lifts off. I have never seen a gift like this in real life. Do they do this because of the sound of ripping wrapping paper? Why not a gift bag? Kelly, I will tell you.

Yes, well, yeah, the sound.

Remember the Fakie bag? That's why we never can carry a real shopping bag, you have to carry the Fakie bag. But also this way, they could just put the gift in and put the top back on, and they didn't have to. Like, have a bunch of pre-wrapped gifts with a onesie inside of it.

Also.

You could do multiple takes.

And also if it was wrapped every time Oscar unwrapped it, he would have to unwrap it exactly the same, so the continuity would match. And you're never going to be able to unwrap it exactly the same.

No, exactly. And a gift bag with tissue paper. I mean, no, that's bad for sound, so Oscar gives Angela this gift and it's a teeny tiny.

Preemie Onesie Yeah.

It's clearly not going to fit that baby.

No, and Kevin gives Angela's baby call of duty, mm-hmm.

Well, I went on Officetelly.

A real-life parrot, yeah.

A real-life swearing parrot, you know?

The screaming parrot thing is pretty amazing. I remember when they were doing those.

Yeah.

This is what kind of cracks me up. Because, you know, if you go to what Pam's blog was and then what Angela's like, how they document their babies and stuff is very different.

Yes, Angela's blog was basically like a.

Shame.

Shame her coworkers.

Shameless.

But this did get me thinking, how could they have done better? So I was a lady who googled and I found a list of gifts you can give a coworker who's having a baby. This list was on Lovetoknow..com and it suggested that if you're in an office, you can pool your money and then buy one of the following gifts. And lady, I have to say I thought these were all brilliant.

Okay.

I'm going to keep these in the back of my mind for anyone who has a baby in the future.

Okay, let's hear them.

Number one a baby bathtub filled with health and toiletry items like washcloths and baby soap and baby first aid supplies.

Love it.

So cute. Number two a big ticket item like a stroller or a high chair, or a breast pump. Number three diapers Just load them up with a bunch of size one, size two diapers and wipes. Number four, a baby basket of board books.

Yeah.

And, finally, a gift certificate for a photo shoot with an infant photographer. What a good idea is that, yeah.

Right, I love it.

I loved all of them.