Good morning everyone and I wish you all a big TGIF! Overall it’s been a pretty good week around here over at the Breakroom! We closed out my first official Dungeons&Dragons session, I made a batch of my amazing lemon bars (the key is juicing your own lemons), been going over our house inspections, have been clearing out a ridiculous amount of personal items that need to be gotten rid of, and taking care one of our poor dogs with a tail infection. When you actually lay them all out it certainly becomes clear that this was a pretty busy week, now I know why I feel so spent! I suppose I have not been the only one with a busy because a few other people around the office, so let me get to that Breakdown.
The big topic of the day was that our own Michael Scott was called upon to be a special lecturer emeritus at Ryan’s business school. I think Michael was just making it a bigger deal than it was, basically the students can bring in their boss to speak to the class and it bumps up their grade a full letter. Ryan figured he’d be crazy not take advantage of that, but I don’t think he thought this through enough before pulling the trigger. But you cannot say that Michael was not going to give this his all because he was geared up and ready, even trying to line up any good advice he’s given before. Dwight said the best advice he has ever given was “Don’t be an idiot.” This advice is very simple, whenever you are about to do something you just ask yourself if an idiot would do it. Spoiler, if you do not know what idiot would do then you’re going to get some outside help with your decision making. Additionally, this motivational picture is meant for you.
Well while that was happening, Pam invited everyone in the office to her art show that evening. She’s been taking some art classes lately to perfect her craft and this is a showcase event where the public and friends/family get to come and see what they have been working on. Unfortunately, most of the office didn’t seem to enthused or else people like Toby were a bit busy. I did make it a point to head down there and see her for a bit, and unfortunately attendance from the office hadn’t been great by the time I’d swung by. Roy and his brother had come through, I guess Oscar and his boyfriend showed up but Pam said she didn’t get a chance to say hi to them. But the event wasn’t over yet so I told her to keep holding out. I personally loved her art, it was simplistic and most consisted of water colors from around the office. Art doesn’t have to be over-the-top or rule changing, art is simply defined by how it speaks to people. I personally loved this one of an exterior shot of the office building and would’ve loved a copy of it.
If you thought all of the excitement was happening out of the office, you would be wrong. It started when Dwight noticed some animal stool on the ground and figured out it must have come from the ceiling above reception. He was pretty smug because he noticed this and was going to be a hero for getting a bird removed from the ceiling, but as soon as she shifted a tile he screamed out that it was actually a bat. This was when people began to freak out as the bat escaped and people were terrified it was going to come at them. We got it locked in the conference room, but then Dwight’s second attempt (accompanied by Creed) got it directed into the back hallway near the bathrooms. Unfortunately, this got Meredith stuck in the women’s room with the bat aside. Incidentally, this inspired a fancy Jim Prank in which he is trying to trick Dwight into thinking he was bit by the bat and changing into a vampire. Oddly enough, Dwight needed very little convincing to buy this because he even had a stake lined up in case he felt like he was in danger. Kudos to Dwight for not assuming Jim would automatically be evil; his sworn enemy and yet he is allowing him to find his way as a vampire. In the end, Dwight runs for it and is able to use a garbage bag to capture the bat, and Meredith’s head.
I know that bats can be very scary, but please, do not go around killing our nocturnal creatures of the night. Most of the bats we are used to eat insects so they help to keep populations of mosquitos down, which also helps mitigate diseases spread by them. Their stool (guano) is also an amazing fertilizer so this helps contribute right back to the environment. Now if you happen to get one in your house or office, it is important to be careful in removing them because they can bite and there is an unfortunate risk of rabies. Incidentally, I have heard that should someone ever wake up in a room and discover a bat was there you are supposed to assume you were bit and go out to get tested. If you go here you can visit the Humane Society’s page on bats so they can help wall through what you need to be aware of when interacting with bats. But please, if possible try to have them relocated alive because we do not want to lose any more bats! For those who really want to support them, perhaps consider getting a bat house. Just like people can set up birdhouses, you can also set up bat houses to offer a special home for our friends the bat1. I personally haven’t set one up so if anyone here has, please leave a comment to give us all the best tips to know about them!
In case you forgot, the original big event for the day was Michael being asked to speak at Ryan’s business class, but I chose to leave the lowdown on this till the end. It sounds like he started off okay, if that is what you would like to call it. He began with ripping up some poor students textbook (which are grossly overpriced, I recommend renting when possible) and then decided to teach them about business. First, there are four types of business: tourism, food service, railroads, sales, hospitals/manufacturing, and air travel. No you did not miscount, Michael seems to have misunderstood the definition of four. From there, he segued into how to start a business. First, you need to have a building followed by deciding on something to sell such as stickers. Basically, the key to starting a business is selling your product and the more you sell, the more profits (fancy word for money) you get.
Ryan is finally able to reign the presentation back in since normally these are a question and answer format, so Michael should just take questions. Unfortunately, Michael sort of choked on the questions. He danced right pass how has Dunder Mifflin adapted to a paperless world. I would have answered that despite these changes, there are aspects in life and business that will always require paper. The key would be to scale back and refocus on those industries that will always need paper. He was then asked what do you say to someone who wants to leave you for a nationwide chain. These are competitive but customer service has always been what set Dunder Mifflin apart so extra focus should be placed on it. Then he was asked how the Herfindahl Index was affected by the merger. This is a business term, essentially it is a means of measuring the level of competitiveness in a set market based on comparable company sizes. Holding an MBA I did study this in school, but have not actually heard this term used out of school although I believe it would be more used in the study of economics. These trends of question ultimately reveal that Ryan has been telling the class he believes Dunder Mifflin will be obsolete in five to ten years. Even the rest of the class seems to agree because there is too much competition and they cannot handle it. Michael goes crazy because he believes Dunder Mifflin is the greatest company, and he is adamant they are wrong because they are simply students with no true business experience. I have to agree, it is very easy for college students to get these ideas of how business is and at the end of the day, until you are out there you have no idea that it isn’t as “out of the book” as we would like to believe. And of course, it is rarely as fair as we would like it to be. But Michael takes control of the situation, storms out, and ultimately gets his justice with Ryan. He relocates Ryan back to the annex, so he is stuck working alongside Kelly all day which is a more than suitable punishment.
And that was what happened around the office today, so what did we learn? It is very scary to put yourself out there in something like pursuing art like Pam did, and when we know someone doing this we should take the time to support them and let them know we are proud of them. We learned that bats can be pretty scary when they surprise us, but they are our neighbors too so they do not deserved to be killed because they are cute and important. And we learned that sometimes business school can be overrated (and a business degree is a guaranteed key to a job anymore) so maybe we acknowledge that school learning needs to be combined with life experience.
I hope you all have a great Friday, remember to get your tickets to Teeb Con in just a few short weeks! And if you learned anything special this week, let us know in the comments. And until next time, I’ll see you around the Breakroom!
- (n.d.). What to do about bats. The Human Society. Retrieved August 1, 2024, from https://www.humanesociety.org/resources/what-do-about-bats#:~:text=Close%20interior%20doors%20and%20give,to%20try%20to%20catch%20them. ↩︎
