Anger management

My first response to a request! Thank you, JORDAN!

Probably my absolute, all time favorite episode of The Office of all time….

Season 3, Episode 13 “The Return.”

Basically, the synopsis of the episode is Oscar returns to the office and there is a Mexican-themed party being thrown for him. While this is all going on, Jim decides to play a prank on Andy and put his cell phone in the ceiling tiles because he cannot stop playing his ringtone (which is, of course, a compilation of Andy singing). Andy gets mad, and well, just watch what happens.

BAHAHA. I love, “In fact, it’s pretty fricken unfunny!”

After this incident, Andy is sent by corporate to get anger management counseling. He eventually returns to Scranton “healed” and decides he now wants to go by the name Andrew.

I honestly cannot help myself from dying laughing every single time at this scene. Especially when the camera shows everyone’s responses to this incident, even Michael Scott’s. I don’t know how any of the actors were able to keep a straight face, let alone how many takes of this scene they had to do.

Obviously The Office is trying to make light of something that affects people every day. And everyone has different ways of dealing with rage. I, in particular, have extreme road rage. I literally catch myself every single day getting into the car, and no more than 20 seconds later I shake my head in annoyance and do the prototypical “double arm raise” which denotes “what in the hell are you doing,” or I have called someone a f*cking idiot. Loud.

Just the other day, I was stopped by some stupid city worker at an intersection, sat there for probably 5 minutes while this gigantic truck carrying heavy machinery backed up to turn left onto a street. And literally this truck came millimeters from my car while the worker stood there. I drive a puny little thing that could be crunched by a moped. A monstrous truck would do much worse damage. I’m sure at this point you can picture me raising my arms (“ARE YOU SERIOUS?!”) and my mouth gaping wide open. The truck finally was able to make a left turn, and the cop that was “patrolling the area” at that time had the nerve to say to me, “Man, that was scary!” NO SHIT! I drove off in a frenzy yelling, “THIS IS ABSURD! LEARN HOW TO DO YOUR JOB!”

Man, I told them.

I proceeded to pick up my friend after this incident and yelled and cursed about it in the car for about 10 more minutes. Then we went hiking and I was able to release my anger that way.

How do you deal with rage? Post it here!

Also, KEEP THOSE REQUESTS COMING! I have a few more I still have to respond to, and will get to them as soon as possible.

Peace, Love, and Rage

 

Customer appreciation

I’m all about listening and sharing ideas with others. And I’m giving all my dedicated readers (HA) a chance to voice their opinion

Is there anything that you would like to see up here on this blog? Is there something from The Office that you’d like to see me compare to real life experiences, and in turn possibly humiliate myself? Post a comment with a YouTube clip, link, or season and episode name and/or number and I’ll do my best to bring more joy to your lives through the art of comedic writing.

Your opinions are valued here at Michael Scott-isms Applied. And remember, there is such a thing as a stupid question. We don’t value those.

 

“Schruted” it

Season 3, episode 12 — Traveling Salesman. Greatttt episode.If you have never watched a season of The Office, I highly suggest watching season 3. One of the best. And the funniest.

Jim and Dwight must go on a sales trip together, and Andy gets put with Michael. Andy is new to the Scranton branch and is trying to get on Michael’s good side by being the ultimate brown-noser. And by doing so, he does his best to discredit Dwight.

Andy screws up on the trip and blows the sale.

I think we’ve all “schruted” our fair share of things, events, incidents, what have you. Here are some pretty “schrutey” (yeah, I just made that one up) things that have occurred (in my opinion):

1. BP and the Gulf oil spill. The CEO of BP knew he was cutting corners on drilling techniques, and he was even warned of what could happen due to his extreme cost cutting. They use a technique called single string casing, which would have saved BP between 7 and 10 million dollars in operating costs. NO other competitors, including Exxon, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, or Shell Oil, use this type of drilling technique. Like you really need to make more money, you oil king. And guess what else? You spent more money trying to clean it up! Way to go, Tony Hayward. You really schruted this one. BP cuts corners article

2. Wall Street. Banks loaned out money they didn’t have. And now the value of the dollar is shit. Thanks a lot, selfish bankers. You’re really making getting a job after graduation so much easier.Scruted.

On a lighter note…

3. Ferbies. Not OK and just plain creepy. Of course I had to look Furby up on Wikipedia and came across these winner phrases that Furby’s “spoke:”

• wee-tah-kah-loo-loo: Tell me a joke.
• wee-tah-kah-wee-loo: Tell me a story.
• wee-tee-kah-wah-tee: Sing me a song.
• u-nye-loo-lay-doo?: Do you want to play?
• u-nye-ay-tay-doo?: Are you hungry?
• u-nye-boh-doo?: How are you?
• u-nye-way-loh-nee-way: Go to sleep now.
• u-nye-noh-lah: Show me a dance.

Ummmm…. WHAT?! Furby is not a language and never will be. SCHRUTED big time. Children should not be allowed these horrible electronic toys. Whatever happened to kids making real friends? Not friends with a plastic toy with fake fur?

4. The producers of CNN’s Crossfire. You let Jon Stewart on your show, and it gets cancelled. Haven’t you ever seen The Daily Show? Did you really think he was going to play nice? No one’s loss but your own… so I guess you must now deal with your own Shrutedness. (Love making up words).

5. Myspace.
6. Game Cube.
7. The XFL.
8. That 80s Show.
10. 4 Loko. Sorry… they’re awful. I don’t care what anybody thinks. Stupidest thing in the world and if you are drinking those you shouldn’t be allowed to drink at all. So just go in your room, drink it by yourself, and don’t bother the rest of us who know that a real cocktail doesn’t consist of an extreme upper and a downer. There’s a reason certain state’s have banned them.

“STIIIIMMPPYYY!! You IDIOOTTT!”

Peace, love, and Anti-Schruted

 

My apologies

Sorry to my readers for being so aloof lately. I know it’s been a while since I have posted last, but I must tell you that I am suffering from a very serious, and incurable disease:

SENIORITIS.

Some definitions of said disease from Urban Dictionary

“A crippling disease that strikes high school [College, too, come on Urban Dictionary], seniors. Symptoms include: laziness, an over-excessive wearing of track pants, old athletic shirts, sweatpants, athletic shorts, and sweatshirts. Also features a lack of studying, repeated absences, and a generally dismissive attitude. The only known cure is a phenomenon known as Graduation.”

” For most people it starts in the second semester of the senior year. Symptoms for the disease include: Unsafe sex, many beer bongs, getting arrested, showing up to school extremely high…”

“The diary of an infected senior:

Dear diary. I have finally come to terms with my life-threatening case of senioritis. And while my parents and teachers tell me I should “get back on the horse” and study hard, I can only spit out the battle cry of my generation:

SENIORITIS: We’d find a cure, but we just don’t fuckin’ care.”

So, as expected, I have been doing the absolute BARE MINIMUM possible to make it through the last few weeks of graduation. I presented my thesis two weeks ago which pretty much consumed my entire existence all semester, and quite honestly, I couldn’t bear the fact of picking up another book or doing an ounce of school work for a few weeks.

And, as horrible as this sounds, I just don’t care anymore. I know how hard I’ve worked these past four years and I deserve a break! I have been a diligent and hard-working student up until this point and I have the grades to prove it. SO BACK OFF!

In season 5, episode 21 titled “Two Weeks,” Michael Scott gives his two weeks notice because he was unhappy with the way corporate was treating him. And while the regular employee would probably continue doing their work up until their official last day, Michael Scott decides to goof off the entire two weeks. And it’s hilarious. Reminded me of myself a little….

How are my fellow seniors coping with their own senioritis?

Peace, Love, and Senioritis.

 

Michael Scott loves parties… and so do I

The party planning committee.

If I were to create a bar graph of the “work” Michael typically does during the day, I’d say majority of his time was dedicated to planning parties. And Michael will not settle for less than the best. Parties must be over-the-top, and usually take up much of the employees work time. And Michael especially loves parties that are celebrating him.

It was my birthday last Friday, April 1 — yes, April Fool’s Day, laugh, get it out of your system now — and my friends and family were amazing. My roomies threw me a great party on Friday night, and I was fortunate enough to receive not one but THREE cakes. One was from my father, one from my roommates, and one from two of my close friends since freshman year. There cake was by FAR the most creative and amazing thing I have ever had the privilege to see and eat. I thank you great friends, AK and TS (you know who you are).

Yup, that’s Michael Scott’s face on my birthday cake. The cake was delicious. Three layer white cake with chocolate frosting in between. I still have more than half of the cake. Don’t judge. Remember, I have 3 cakes. I’m special. So ha.

If you are interested in eating cake, comment on this post and we can arrange a time for you to stuff your face. It’s BYOM (Bring Your Own Milk).

 

A great cause

In 2009, a YouTube video of a wedding party doing a choreographed dance to Chris Brown’s Forever went viral on the internet. Today, the video has over 60 million views, and these choreographed, over-the-top wedding dances have become extremely popular.Here’s the original:

Not too long after the wedding, Chris Brown was arrested for allegedly attacking his girlfriend at the time, Rihanna. Click here for an article covered on ABC.com.

After the incident and due to the viral activity of the video, Jill and Kevin decided to start a foundation to raise money to end domestic violence for the Sheila Wellstone Institute. The couple and their wedding dance got SO MUCH press, they even did an encore of the dance on The Today Show.

The reason I bring this up? The employees of Dunder Mifflin did their own reenactment of the dance at Pam and Jim’s wedding (Pam and Jim had no idea) in season 6, episodes 4 and 5. Gotta love Pam and Jim. I tear up every time…

Sorry it’s not the greatest quality.

 

Re: Ryan started the fire!

Just a few hours ago, my two friends and I were enjoying a regular Saturday morning/ afternoon. I made iced tea in the AM, it is definitely an iced tea kind of day. Temperature: 34 degrees (thank you weather channel). Meh, so it’s pretty cold, but there isn’t a cloud in the sky and when I woke up this morning I was mesmerized by the sun. It made me remember the iced tea maker my mom gave me at the beginning of the year semester and it, since the end of the summer, has been unused and forgotten.

Anyway, the reason for this post, My friends and I were watching some documentary narrated by Merryl Streep and music with Sting. Except we had it on mute and didn’t realize until the credits rolled.

So we moved on to cooking popcorn and I volunteered to make a couple of bags. I looked at the bag to see how long I should put them in the microwave for and suddenly realized how stupid popcorn directions are.

“Listen to the POP the know when to STOP.” ummm… OK?

Directions (my comments in parantheses):

1. Microwave ovens vary (they DOOO?)
Cooking time may need to be adjusted. Popping may take more or less than 1 minute 30 seconds. (Ok, this isn’t gourmet, it’s actually just popcorn.) Place bag in center of oven (Oh, I was going to place the bag on the side of the microwave. Glad they reminded me of that one.) THIS SIDE UP (see picture of hand putting bag in microwave. Again, thank you for demonstrating how to put a bag of popcorn in the microwave). Set time for 1 minute to 1 minute 30 seconds on HIGH (haha, high).

2. (Please look at this picture. “POP! 1 sec… 2 sec… POP! STOP!” Is that REALLY what hapens when I cook popcorn?! You have got to be kidding me!)Stay by microwave and listen (Well this doesn’t seem very safe. Orville Redenbacher’s, you’ve really just diminished your credibility. Radiation — EVERY HEARD OF IT?). Stop microwave when popping slows to 1 to 2 seconds (do I need a stop watch? Is there a supplies list?) between pops. Overcooking will cause scorching and burning (and we DEFINITELY don’t want that… ouch).

3. OPEN BAG CAREFULLY (Check. See photo with arrows and smelly wave lines) Caution – bag and contents are very hot (oh, I thought things coming out of the microwave were going to be cold. This has completely changed my perspective on life.) Open bag by pulling top corners only. Open away from face (Check.). Children should not prepare without adult supervision (shit… my mom is all the way back in Chicago.). Enjoy! (OK!)

Directions offered in Spanish too.

THANKFULLY none of my kernels succumbed to “scorching and burning.”

Moral of the story: good thing Orville Redenbacher supplied with directions to a food that has been around for thousands of years.

“Maize (Zea mays L. ssp. mays, pronounced /ˈmeɪz/), known in many English-speaking countries as corn, is a grain domesticated by indigenous peoples in Mesoamerica in prehistoric times. The Aztecs and Mayans cultivated it in numerous varieties throughout central and southern Mexico, to cook or grind in a process called nixtamalization. Later the crop spread through much of the Americas. Between 1250 and 1700, nearly the whole continent had gained access to the crop.” (Wikipedia, yes I trust Wikipedia. So sue me.)

Farewell.

 

Ryan started the fire!

In season 2, episode 4, the office of Dunder Mifflin experiences a minor fire emergency. At the end of the episode, it is revealed that “Ryan started the fire!” Dwight is ecstatic (out of spite) to find out that “smart, business school Ryan” was the culprit. Gotta love his reaction:

So I decided to do a little research about the origins of the original song, “We Didn’t Start the Fire,” by Billy Joel.

According to Wikipedia (gotta love it), Joel released the song in 1989 on his album Storm Front. The song alludes to the headline events beginning in 1949 (the year Joel was born) until the year it was released. The song has been interpreted as a rebuttal to the criticisms of the Baby Boomer generation (Joel’s generation), or those people born post-WWII. “The fire” refers to the conflict and societal turmoil that was occurring at the time and was being blamed on the Baby Boomers. Joel’s song claims these issues cannot be blamed on a single generation because “it [the fire] was always burning… no we didn’t light it, but we tried to fight it.”

Joel says about the song: “I had turned forty” It was 1989, and I said, ‘Okay, what’s happened in my life?’ I wrote down the year 1949. Okay, Harry Truman was the president. Popular Singer of the day, Doris Day. China went Communist… South Pacific… Walter Winchell… Joe DiMaggio. Then I went to 1950, Richard Nixon, Joe McCarthy, big cars… et cetera, et cetera” (from Bill DeMain’s book In Their Own Words: Songwriters Talk About the Creative Process).

Dwight references this line from the song:

Joe McCarthy, Richard Nixon, Studebaker, television, North Korea, South Korea, Marilyn Monroe

Some other fun facts about “We Didn’t Start the Fire”:

Unlike most of Joel’s songs, the lyrics were written before the melody.
It was Joel’s 3rd Billboard #1 hit.
Blender magazine ranked “We Didn’t Start the Fire” #41 on its list of the “50 Worst Songs Ever.”

We didn’t start the fire
It was always burning
Since the world’s been turning
We didn’t start the fire
No we didn’t light it
But we tried to fight it

***What other political/ activist songs or artists do you like?***

ie Bob Dylan, Rage Against the Machine, Green Day

 

Speechless

Something we can all agree on: accidents suck. And I think they suck mostly because you experience a wave of emotions unbeknown to our conscious. And they come with such force that we are left- for a lack of a better word- speechless.

Poor, Michael Scott. Your situation is so grim yet not grim enough where any and every onlooker will laugh at your demise. But stand strong, Michael. Fortunately, Meredith will be just fine. The rest of the episode is hilarious (season 4, episode 1), I highly recommend setting aside 42 minutes for this gem. If you have Netflix, enjoy it instantly!

As a matter of fact, I know exactly how Michael Scott feels. Believe it or not, I’ve hit a few things in my six (almost) years of driving- thankfully never a person. But I proudly say nearly everything I’ve hit was within my first year of driving (LOVE YOU, Mom). My track record has been cleaned since then. So I’ve put together a nice little slide show of the inanimate objects I have hit:

Accidents Happen Slide Show

there are also some pretty funny YouTube videos of accidents. Share your favorite here!

Also, what’s your driving record like? Be honest…

Another thing to think about… states with the worst drivers? My opinion: Rhode Island. Sorry. No wait, I’m not. Rhode Island’s driving schools should be sorry.

Peace, Love, and “Speechful” Driving 🙂

 

A little off topic

Hey, everyone. Thanks to all of you so far who have subscribed!

If you think you’ve subscribed, there’s a good chance you haven’t. After you click the “Sign me up!” button, you have to confirm your e-mail. WordPress will send you an e-mail with a link. Click it.

Back to business, I wanted to share something with all of you, and although it’s a little off topic, I figured it was OK since getting off topic is what Michael Scott does best.

I created this movie for class and I think it’s pretty interesting. It looks at the ways in which listeners have consumed music over several decades compared to today’s “digital native.”

Take a look, and give me some feedback.

How do you get your music? Do you share music with friends? If so, how? Are you worried about getting caught by the Federal government? Why or why not? Do you think it is considered stealing to download music from the internet without paying for it?

Just some bees for your bonnets (as my Shakespeare professor used to say).