The Office: Season 4, Episode 5 “Launch Party Part 1”

Good morning everyone, welcome back to the Breakroom! We have had a pretty exciting week around here: had a good snowfall earlier this week (already melted), planning for Thanksgiving celebrations next week, and one my colleagues got a great new job opportunity so we will absolutely miss them! Of course, such transitions are never easy in going through that transition to bringing in a new person and getting them all trained up, but we are up to the challenge!

Other than that, I am also really getting excited for the holidays, and that is including with Black Friday. I haven’t gotten anything from Amazon (although I did find my Woobles on sale) but I did my Olipop on sale (directly on their site here). I might have do my top deals from Black Friday this next week like I did last year. I focused on office supplies last year so I might lean more into great ideas for Secret Santa.

But enough about the holidays in the future, let us focus on the present and get today’s Breakdown!

We started off strong with taking part in the age-old practice of not paying attention during a meeting. So what happened was Pam claimed to have seen the DVD logo in the screensaver (the one which bounces around the screen) perfectly land in the corner. Now I have tried to see this happen many times in my life, all the way back to high school, so I had my reservations. So while Michael was rambling with his presentation (something about updating quarterly reports with pictures or puzzles) we all watched in awe waiting for the logo to line up perfectly. And like bee landing on a flower, we were rewarded with seeing the perfect landing. I truly did not think it was possible but I am here to say that if you put in a little bit of patience, you can be rewarded. And, simultaneously, take up an unnecessary meeting.

In other news, the major update is that Ryan’s brain child, Dunder Mifflin Infinity, is officially launching. Michael is excited because he was going to the big launch party in New York being held at a club with sushi, while the rest of us get to partake in our branch’s party which will get to be connected via video chat. I guess it is a big deal, but I’m not sure how Ryan was able to talk corporate into doing such big launch party for literally just allowing customers to buy paper online. I feel that money could have gone into marketing or other so of initiatives. But Ryan really wanted to emphasize that he believes the website will be the top salesman at the company by the end of the day, and Dwight was not ready to allow that to happen. He declared a challenge to the website and insisted that he would outsell the website, and retain his title as top salesman. He has been going through a lot lately since his girlfriend dumped him so I felt he needed this. Plus Ryan has been a bit of a pain since he got his promotion, so I like the idea that Dwight could hold this over him. Angela was serious doubts that Dwight could succeed, although Andy was fully behind him in his goal. They got a white board to tally the results and were even trying to come up with cool ways that Andy could signal each sale that Dwight makes. The ending decision was a bear horn, so you can expect things will get loud.

While that was going on, the Party Planning Committee was hard at working putting together the Scranton launch party. Angela has normally been tense but she is in rare form today, and it doesn’t help that Phyllis continues to make mistakes. The big one was when they went to unfurl the banner stating “Launch Party” it actually said “Lunch Party.” Phyllis has also noticed Angela’s attitude lately, and decided to try to Google “how to deal with difficult people” and see if this gives some tips to assist.

I also did this, and of course the Google AI sums up a lot of this at the top, so here is what Google was able to sum up:

Stay Calm: It is important to keep cool and not get too upset. Getting upset can often make the situation worse, especially if they are the type who is just waiting to say “I cannot deal with your hysterics.”

Show Respect: Even if they are not acting tastefully, you should show and treat them respect. This is difficult to do but if the situation escalates, at least it can land on their inability to act reasonable.

Set Boundaries: Make it clear what is acceptable in your interaction and stick to those boundaries. If you cave in, it simply means they feel they can continue to act difficult.

Don’t take it Personally: Some people are naturally unpleasant or they might have personal things going on that they are taking out on you. Don’t let it get to you and have you blaming yourself for their actions.

Listen: Try to see their side of the situation; while this doesn’t apply to every situation, sometimes they are simply taking their bad day out on you and they might not be dealing with their emotions as well as they should.

Offer Solutions: Try to come up with alternates to the situation that can benefit everyone involved with the situation.

Debrief: Regardless of the end result, it is best to speak to someone else so you can relay how the interaction went to see if they might have better insight. Additionally, if this happens to be a toxic person who might try to pin any problems on you, this way you have support.

Practice self-care: Take care of yourself; acknowledge when the situation is not good for you and not about you, and be able to recognize when you should disengage. If this is at work, be prepared to go to your leader or human resources if necessary because there is a correct means that your colleagues should talk to you and treat you.

While Angela is struggling to put together her launch party, which I felt she really was complaining too much because I could’ve whipped something up in a week and she has spent like three weeks, Michael was preparing for his party in New York. He tried on outfits for us (including one that I am positive was a woman’s blouse) and then he got a call from Jan who said she wasn’t willing to go to the party with him. I guess after being fried from the company, she doesn’t want to run into a bunch of smug people she used to work with. Newly available, Michael offers the tickets to Jim and Pam! And by offers, he means that they get to dual it out to see who gets to go with him, and this results in Jim escorting him to the big shindig. They left all excited, with Michael carrying a copy of Green Eggs and Ham to gift Ryan for his achievement and say we can all head out early! Evidently he felt that the party that Angela has been “planning” wasn’t worth any of us sticking around.

And less than an hour later, they have returned! So evidently the invitation Michael got was to access a chatroom which is the live stream to the party in New York. First excited, Michael is now livid that Ryan didn’t want to invite him to the party and has a newfound motivation to make our party better than the one in New York. So now, Angela has exactly one hour to make the office party rival that of the one being held in a hip club in New York City, catered with sushi and champagne.

And that, is where we leave you! You’ll have to stop in next week so we can see if we can rise to Michael’s challenge. Until then, stay tuned for extra updates this next week leading up to Thanksgiving! Will I do another Party Planning segment with a recipe? While I shine a light on Black Friday shopping? You’ll have to stop on by to find out.

Until then, I’ll see you around the Breakroom!