The Paper Ep 9: Matching Ponchos

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We were on the office together and we're best friends. Ultimate Office Lovers podcast, just for you. Each week we will dive deeper into the world of the office with exclusive interviews, behind-the-scenes details. Pour the offslate. Hi there, Angela. Hey, good morning. Good morning. You were telling me a tale as I was warming up my coffee this morning about. Your mascara. Well, here's the thing, you guys.

I walked in, said good morning to Sam, good morning to Jenna, hi to Matt on Zoom. I go to use the restroom. I have a massive mascara clump on my cheek. Mm-hmm. Nobody. I didn't know I was in my own world getting my coffee ready. No, apparently I didn't look up for my phone when you came in. Apparently not. But also I guess Josh didn't notice when I say goodbye to him. I always give him a kiss goodbye. No giant black clump and mascara on my cheek.

But pretty much this morning has been a little bit of a get ready fail. I slept with my hair wet, so you know what I woke up to. Your hair looks great for having slept with it wet. I tried to tame my hair all morning. It looks great. Well, it's underneath. Don't look at the back. Okay. Whatever. Let it go. Let go of the back of my head a long time ago. But then also I will hold on to makeup way past.

the time you're supposed to hold on to it. Like like my powder compact right now is just one tiny square that's left. Most of it is broken off. And then I will smooth what's left of the powder. Mm-hmm. And then it like I'm not throwing that away. Well, I was doing this with my blush as well. And I it had I had dropped it once, so I had a crack through it. Mm-hmm.

And it was getting a little precarious, but I still kept finding a way to use it. And this morning I'm rushing'cause my hair is crazy. And I grab that blush out of the drawer and I open it and all the inside of it has crumbled like a fine paper. And it went All over. You just like blush confetti? All over the sink, all over the counter. I ch had to change my top. So I don't know what the lesson is, you guys. Maybe just like When things are past their due date, let'em go.

You know, this sounds like my New Year's resolution about like little fixes, big wins. Yeah. Like if you fix that problem. Then it won't explode on you later. Maybe it's okay to toss that very old blush. I think it's three years old. Well, you know, lady, my problem is that now I can barely see without my glasses. I cannot read at all. You know I already worry about the apocalypse.

Sure. I'm worried that I'm going to lose my glasses during the apocalypse and then I'm not even going to be able to read a book during it. Oh, that'd be horrible. Can you imagine? No. I worry that I'm going to be barefoot during the apocalypse and it's going to be like diehard where he's running around barefoot.

Trying to fight the bad guys. This is another one of my worries. Yes. Shoes and glasses. Very important. Well, I can't see my face when I put my makeup on anymore. And it doesn't matter if I use one of those magnifying mirror things. It's not enough magnification. So every morning When I do my makeup, then I put my glasses on and I see what I've done. And it's never great. Do you have to tone it down?

It's not the toning it down. It's that like the eyeliner isn't in any way straight. It looks straight to me when I put it on in a blur. Right. Or I will have like gobs of mascara underneath my eye and I can't see them until I put my glasses on. So I have to do my makeup, then put my glasses on and then go in with like a wet q-tip and like fix everything. I wonder what we're gonna look like when we're old ladies.

Like like legit old ladies. Like I think I'm gonna have too much blush. Yeah. Too much blush, too much lip. And you're gonna have like a lot of mascara globs. Yeah. I can't wait.

I can't wait. I I feel the same way. I don't mind. All right. Should we get into our fan chit chat question of the week? Yes. Should we also say what we're here to discuss today? I mean, we can, you guys, we're gonna get to it. We're doing episode nine of the paper. It's called Matching Ponchos, but first, let's have a chit-chat. This one's coming to us from Alexander G in College Station, Texas.

Howdy, Jenna, and Angela. I'm Alexander G from College Station, Texas. My question for you guys is, if you guys have not pursued acting, what would y'all's career be? I'm very curious to know you guys' answer to this question and love the pod. Thank you guys. All right. Thank you, Alexander. I know. I thought that was such a thoughtful question. Mm-hmm. I've thought about this. Yeah.

I know my answer. Well, you should go. I think I would be a vet tech. Oh, you'd be such a great vet tech. You have such a heart for animals, Jenna. Yeah, I mean, those were the two choices I was weighing when I was younger. I thought, do I want to become a veterinarian? Do I want to become a vet tech? Do I want to become an actor? Right before I got my job on the office.

I had just started doing rescue work with Kitten Rescue, and they teach you like a lot of vet tech kind of stuff, you know, giving medications, giving fluids, giving vaccines, being able to spot illnesses, things like that. There's a lot of that in the rescue stuff. And I really loved it. So I called my manager, Naomi, and my acting coach Robert, and I said, you guys.

I think I might want to make a change. If something doesn't happen this pilot season, I think I want to take some time off. I want to go to two years of vet tech school. I just the acting thing is feeling like Just eight years of rejection. Like I'm just like that's no joke. It has worn me down. Yeah, it's it can be a real beatdown. Yeah. And this other thing is giving me purpose. It's making me feel joyful. I feel needed and I feel good at it.

And I wanna pursue that and then I'll know like, should I go back to acting? But I might need to take like a sabbatical. Well As we know, I ended up going out for the office and then everything sort of changed and that path was the one chosen for me. But I've continued to do the animal rescue work. I mean, I'm fostering kittens right now. I mean, that's one of the first things I learned about you.

In our friendship. Yeah. You were fostering kittens the first time I went to your house. Oh, is that true? Yes. Oh my gosh. That's right. We had a a screening of the pilot of the office and I had foster kittens. Yeah. I remember that. I've been fostering and socializing little feral kittens for over twenty years now and I love it. So I think if I wasn't an actor, that's what I would do. And I think if I hadn't gotten cast on the office, I very well might be doing that right now.

And I'm kind of doing it. Kinda doing both. Yeah. You are. You found a space for both things in your life. Yeah. What about you, Sam? Growing up I really wanted to own a comic book store. But I was alive when everything went to Amazon. So like there's no real physical print media anymore. Oh yeah, there's like five existing comic book stores left in Los Angeles. There's one in the valley our son has been to. Yeah, the ones that have been there have been going for like thirty, forty years now.

But yeah, that's what I'm saying. Sam, have you been to Secret Headquarters? I have, yeah. That's my home shop. I love Secret Headquarters in Silver Lake, yeah. Shout out to Secret Headquarters. It's a what all can you find there, Sam? Everything. They're really well stocked. They're up to date. They're really knowledgeable and really nice. Sam, I could really see you.

running a comic book store. I could too. I could also see you back in the day running a video store. Yes. And knowing about like all the movies and being able to suggest a movie. Yeah. Like the local one. Like I know growing up The town where I would go visit my grandparents. Yeah.

They didn't have Blockbuster, but they just had a guy that had started a collection and had his own little like sh store where you could go rent movies. Yeah. I also grew up in a real small town in Wisconsin, so I didn't have that big of dreams. I distinctly remember seeing the movie Clerks and being like, Oh, I could do this. Like I could work in a menial job forever. But a creative one. Exactly. Yeah. Matt, what about you?

I think high school history or English teacher. I think I might still want to do that one day. It's just like big shout out to teachers. It's such a grind and so hard and so kind of thankless, but I would love to do that one day. Oh, Matt, my mom was a history teacher, middle school history teacher for over thirty five years. Yeah, eighth grade. Middle school would be tough.

Yeah. Yeah. And Jenna's sister is a teacher and my sister's a teacher. Mm-hmm. Yeah. So lots of love for teachers here at Office Ladies. All right, Angela, what about you? Well, you know, growing up in Indonesia, a big part of my life was the ocean. And we'd go out to the Thousand Islands and it was my real happy place. I loved to explore. I just loved it and my love for it has never stopped. And so often on For years I thought

Maybe I would go into some type of marine biology. Mm-hmm. And then, you know, I always had the acting bug, but those were my two loves. And then since being out in California, I started working with Oceana, which is a nonprofit trying to help. save our oceans and protect them. But ocean preservation is really meaningful to me. So I think I'd do something with that. Something about protecting these very fragile marine ecosystems and

We need the ocean, you guys. We need it. We need to take care of it. So yeah, I think doing something like that. Yeah, that's cool. I could see that. Yeah. Yeah. It's interesting always to think about like your parallel universe life, like you know, the movie sliding doors. Like what's what's that other version of you somewhere? I can see you somehow being a mascot.

For the ocean. For ocean cleanup. With like the six pack rings on you, like you cutting them. I could see you like teaching kids through song. To cut those or straws go in turtles' noses. Yeah, exactly. Don't throw away that plastic bag. It looks like a jellyfish. Exactly, yeah. Oh, it's already begun.

You're mixing your improv performance with ocean preservation. There it is. And I did. I did a trip to Belize, you guys know with Rashida Jones. I've talked about that and to sort of highlight the barrier reef there. So yeah. Well thank you, Alexander. We love getting to talk about all that. I love that conversation. Why don't we take a break? And when we come back, we'll discuss episode nine of the paper matching punch.

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All right, we are back from break. It's time to talk about episode nine, matching ponchos, written by L.E. Correa and directed by Dave Rogers. Yes, Dave Rogers. And he gave us. The best tidbits about this episode. Such good ones. I mean, listen, everyone we reach out to in the office universe has always been so amazing. But for like super specific details.

Dave Rogers is like all star. A hundred percent. Give us a summary, Jenna. All right. Ned and Mare embark on a road trip to interview a possible cult leader. Meanwhile, Oscar seeks to confront his online troll, and Esmeralda has fallen under the spell of a young photo of Barry. This is I think my favorite episode. I think it's mine too. There's so many moments that I was like, ah, I love this moment. Same.

All right, we're gonna start with a cold open. Ken and Travis are manning a softies toilet paperslash ice cream truck. Ken is dressed as a milkman, Travis is dressed as Santa, and they're handing out what looks like to be ice cream cones. Did you see what was on the side of the truck? No, what? I mean it was painted with the softies logo and all that. It was painted pink and white with the softies logo, like the softies lady that we've seen. But there was some signage huge on the side.

I had to freeze on it. It said Quote, by touching a cone, I waive any legal claims or rights. Oh wow. So I kind of have to call BS on the parents that are letting their kids take these cones and they all bite into them thinking they're ice cream. They look like toilet paper. They are toilet paper. They're little mini rolls of toilet paper on an ice cream cone. They smell like mint, which is just what you want to wipe your sensitive areas with. What? Yeah, this whole thing is their sort of like

goodwill way of trying to get the community to forgive them for the giant sewer clog that they caused. Yeah. And Marv put Kin in charge of this sort of brand rehabilitation effort, right? I have questions. Oh yeah. Number one. How much money did this company spend on this custom painted ice cream truck and these tiny toilet paper rolls that fit on top of ice cream cones? Like this was a lot of money.

I mean, I'm just gonna go out on a limb here and say I don't think Ken always has the best ideas. Marv maybe should take a look at Ken's like budget for things. Also, why is Travis dressed like Santa Claus? Is it December? Is this their like nod to Christmas? Is this their Christmas episode cold open? Listen, we don't know the answer to this question, but in my mind The character of Travis is like, Oh, we gotta dress up. Okay, I have a Santa outfit.

Yeah, I'm gonna see kids. Kids love Santa. And Ken's like, I'm gonna dress like an ice cream dude. And Travis is like, oh, well, all I have is a Santa suit. I don't know. 'Cause it looks like summer outside to me. Like it looks warm. The kids are not wearing coats and scarves and stuff. It doesn't look like winter in Ohio. It looks like at best early autumn.

Well, what it made me realize is that in season one of the paper there was never a holiday episode. There was not a Halloween episode. There was not a Christmas. We have not seen this group celebrate a holiday. I would just put this out there, season two, writers. Mm-hmm. I feel like a holiday episode would give lots of stuff to write in the paper.

I know. And we personally we loved getting to shoot them. So yeah. America Go report on the Christmas festival of lights. There you go. There it is. It writes itself. Well. Just what you guys want. Writing pitches from us. Well what's gonna happen in this cold open, like we said, is the kids start to eat it. They realize it's toilet paper. They get really angry. The parents get angry. They start throwing the toilet paper rolls at the truck and then Ken and Travis have to peel out of there.

And I just call BS on the parents. If I walk up to a truck that says by touching a cone, I waive any legal claims or rights. I might be like, this is not the ice cream for us. Yeah. Also, if it's not Christmas time and there's a man dressed as Santa inside of an ice cream truck, I'm gonna steer my child in another direction. Turn around.

We did ask Dave Rogers about this scene and this is what he said. He said one thing that was super tricky was the kids all wanted to throw the toilet paper cones as soon as we shot take one, but they only had a limited amount. So Dave needed these kids to wait before they could throw them. And I just can't imagine that. Cause like you tell a kid they get to throw something.

They're just gonna go all out immediately. Well, we used to do stuff like that on the office. Like I remember there was a scene where A cake got destroyed, but we only had so many cakes. So we would shoot the top of it over and over and over again. And then we just shot the destroy the cake part. At the very end? Yeah. Dave said, needless to say, cones would accidentally get thrown. So there'd always be one kid who couldn't resist.

Well now the episode begins and we find out Mare has been approved. to go investigate if this I guess what is it? Farm is actually a cult. Yeah. It's a farm that's three hours south of Toledo. And she's pretty excited to get to the bottom of this. Also, her neighbor's son, I guess, is at the cult. And

missed his mom's birthday, so she's like, I'm gonna investigate. She was supposed to go with Dutrick, but when she goes to grab him to get on the road, he says, I can't go with you. He's afraid he'll end up joining a cult. He had a dream about it the night before that he joined. So quickly Ned comes out and is like, I'll go with you. And he's super excited about it. So now the two of them are going to take off on this adventure. Well, he loves.

Buying his squash from this farm community at the farmer's market. He's like, I'd love to see where they grow it. Yeah.

Up next is my favorite Esmeralda storyline in the whole first season so far. Really? Yes. Okay. I liked it more than her and Kin and Kahoots. Okay. I might vote for her and Ken and Kahoots, but I did like this part. I thought she shined. Oh my God, Sabrina is so good. What we learn is this first talking out is so funny. She found in the archives of the paper an old picture of Barry.

when he was thirty and he was very handsome. He was very handsome. Very handsome. Well, that image really stuck in Esmeralda's mind. And then I guess Basically, she has a sexual fantasy dream about Barry when he was in his thirties. But Esmerilda, of course, that's not how she like shares about it. She says Barry did something very inappropriate. Because he came into my dreams and he had his way with me.

And she said, listen, if that happened once, fine. Okay, I was willing. There was a mutual attraction. But she's like, Barry is now coming to me every night. Okay. I have needs, maybe more than other people, but I mean, then I come into work and he pretends like nothing happened. How dare he? As if Barry is gonna know that she is having sexy time dreams about him. Lady, this happened to me.

What? I had a sex dream about a coworker once. Is it anyone I know? Yes. What? It was I yeah. And I couldn't look at him for three days. I couldn't look at him. You know what? I think I know who it is. It was so weird. Are you gonna say who it is? Can I guess? I'm having a memory. I'm having a memory. Shoot, I forget who it was, but it's it wasn't who I anyone would expect. Yes, I will only say this. I'm not gonna say who it was because I don't want any clickbait articles about it.

But it was during my time on the office. It was while I sat at reception and this person sat in the bullpen. Like you could see everybody from reception. So I'm including everyone in the bullpen. Except not really the accounting note. Hmm, yeah, I could see the accounting nook if I wanted to. Okay. You're trying to whittle it down and I won't let you. But it's not who all the clickbaity people would want it to be. Correct. Correct. I'll just it wasn't John, everybody. There.

Yeah. But someone entered my dream, as happened to Sabrina, and we had hot, sexy time. Oh my God, lady. And then I couldn't look at them for three days. I was so embarrassed. Well, I wonder if you had to do a curse. We'll get to it. Remove the curse. Angela, has that ever happened to you? Like have you ever had a sex dream about a coworker or somebody who then you have to see? I haven't.

I'm sorry. I haven't. I mean, every once in a while I'll watch a movie and then it's maybe like have a dream about someone in the movie like that I found super attractive. Sure. That's so lame. I'm kinda lame. I think at work though, it's like, I don't know, I just always

I don't know, I don't know. I mean, I think it really surprised me because usually, you know, I just dream about someone like Brad Pitt giving me soup. Right. You know? Like I dreamed that Ryan Gosling ran errands with me. And it was super hot. Yes. He was like driving and I was in the passenger seat. And I was like running I was like going through the list of places we needed to go, but I was so attracted to him and I was like, play it cool. Play it cool. You're just running errands.

Oh my God, I feel like our love languages are so clear. I know. Run errands with me or make me soup.

Well, next up we're gonna get to the scene that you and I saw being filmed in person when we visited the set of the paper. It is this scene that begins Oscar's storyline, Oscar's delicious, wonderful storyline. He gets a comment. A little comment pops up on his computer. He's written a review of South Pacific and someone has commented on it. Someone named Go Mudheens 10. And they're insulting Oscar. They say, geez.

How many more adverbs can you use? And they call him an asshat. Yes, I love the term asshat. I do as well. It makes me asshat and dip sh always bring me joy. Those are your two faves? Yeah. Um Ada Lola is gonna have a talking head where she explains sort of the trend that's been happening. Troll will pounce on anyone that gets any tiny mistake wrong, but they use weirdly dated internet memes to insult everyone from probably circa 2012.

Well, there was a runner in the extended Peacock version where Travis, Detrick, and Adam read some of the outdated ways that Go Mudhens Tin comment on things. And I just, it cracked me up. I wanted us to hear it. Wow, your third article about brook trout this week. It's a maze balls how you refuse to broaden your scope. ErmurGird. Dangling modifier alert. I don't I don't understand any of that. Epic fact check fail. This is funny. Go modern's ten is funny. Yeah.

This just made me laugh, like a maize balls, ermeur, and like sale. It's as if like maybe me or you.

We're stuck in that time too, I think, sometimes. We are. Well now Ned and Mare are gonna get on the road. Ned goes to open up the door to Mare's car, she's gonna drive, and a bunch of trash falls out. So much. I took a screen grab. There's all these takeout containers, wrappers, water bottles, like it's all over the place. I was curious you guys, is your car? Tidy. I want to do a poll in stories.

Are you a mayor or are you like tidy in your car? Um, I feel like I'm between mayor and tidy. Like uh things don't fall out of my car when you open the door. Like mayor feels a lot more in the world of Michael Scott. Remember when Michael and Ryan are cleaning out his car, blue blast? Blue blast. There's still some night swept on the stick. And the like the fish sandwiches containers.

Sam, what about you? Are you mare or are you tidy? I'm obsessively neat and tidy with my car. I get it washed every week. Oh my goodness. All right. I've become very tidy. My wife, I don't know, she's pretty organized in general, but just Treats the car like a total trash dump and like puts trash in pockets and little side holders. I'm like, why? Why so I clean it out now, but I wouldn't be like that normally, but it's a reaction to her.

You know, so I'm always been pretty tidy with my car, but there was a chapter of my life when the kids were little that I just had to like turn the other way. There were like there were those goldfish crackers everywhere and Cheerios and there'd be like some kind of sticky something on something and I just was like, this is what this car is. This car is like a human people mover. It's a traveling high chair. Yes.

That's what I'm my wife will like take like we'll be at a party or something and like she'll have a paper plate and doesn't want to throw it out there and like we'll take it and then like put it in our car. I'm like, You're taking trash into our car that doesn't have to be there. That's hilarious. I do have good friends where the wife is similar. And one time impromptu I asked her to give me a ride. We were leaving a thing at the school.

And I was just like, Oh, hey, could you give me a ride to my car? I had to park far. And the look of just like sheer terror that came over her face, she was like, uh I was like, it's just a few do you mind? And she was like, uh and then when I walked after her car, I was like, I think she saw my face of like oh my god. I was like, it's you know what? I'll walk. It's fine. It's fine. There was so much you couldn't see the front seat. There was so much stuff. Wow.

Wow. Okay. Well, did you notice Ned's Ziploc bag full of snacks? I did. For the car ride. I did. It warmed my heart. It made me remember when we went on our work retreat up to Santa Barbara last year when we met Kendra. Yeah. You drove, Ange. Do you remember what I ate? It's all I ate. I was still in during my treatment and I would get really nauseous in the car, especially. I mean, I would just get I was just spent a year nauseous basically.

But all I could eat was saltines. Yeah, I was gonna say crackers and they got everywhere. Everywhere. I just ate. sleeves of saltines the whole car ride. And I didn't understand how how many little saltine cracker particles could like travel. I found them all over the place. I felt so bad. Like when we finally Got home and dropped your car off. I was like, I apologize, like please, I'm so sorry. It's okay. It's okay.

Well, we're back in the office now. Esmeralda's in the kitchen with Nicole and she's explaining. these sex dreams that she's having about him. It did crack me up. Nicole was like, wait, I'm confused. Are these like a nightmare? And Esmeralda was like, oh no, he was wonderful. Okay. Very surprising. I can't complain about that. But then she says, it's just now I think maybe he's an incubus. Like he's like a sexual demon. And Nicole's like, maybe you should talk to a professional about that.

Well I was curious what is an incubus. So I looked it up. First of all, it's a rock band. Oh yeah, that I knew. Yep. But it is also a malevolent mythological demon believed to sexually prey on women while they sleep, causing nightmares and sleep paralysis. Oh. Incidentally, you can also be hunted by a succubus. which is a female demon who comes to men in their dreams to seduce them and drain them of their energy. And according to the National Library of Medicine,

Studies indicate that 11 to 12 percent of people in the general population have reported being visited by an incubus or a succubus. Come on. 11 to 12 percent. It's more common in students. And psychiatric patients in that group of people, it has happened forty-one percent of the time. Yeah. But it's not considered a nightmare. It's an actual like haunting from a demon that enters your dreams and has sex with you.

Huh. Well, we did get a letter. Not about not about that. Okay. This is very different, but I found it interesting. Trish from Chicago, Illinois, wrote in to say, Hi there, longtime listener of Office Ladies, and I couldn't help but think of Angela Martin with this blouse that Esmeralda is wearing. Did you ladies see all of those buttons? Did you notice the blouse? Now that you say that

I know, I saw that comment and I went and looked and it is like ye oldy blousey blouse with those tiny little like satin buttons that go all the way down and down the wrist as well. Yeah. But I can tell you who would not want an incubus and that's Angela Martin. This is true. She would be like, Get thee behind me, Satan. I feel like she would know what to do. She would.

Well now some really amazingly delicious, hilarious car driving scenes are gonna start. It's Ned and Mare in the car. I actually texted Chelsea and I said, I just want you to know we are gonna be singing your praises because Those driving scenes were amazing. I sent her the same text. Did you really Well, n the driving scenes start with Ned and Mir kind of wondering, would they be

prey to a cult. They easily fall into one, right? And as they're talking, they go past like a meadow and there's sheep and he's like, Oh my gosh, that sheep looks like flossy. He had a sheep growing up. And then he tells Mare, but then, you know, it had to go live on this farm. And Mare is like, oh my God. No, that sheep died. They just tell you that. It's the animal's gonna go live on a farm. Yeah, she's also like How did you have a sheep growing up? What are you, a Hungarian prince?

That's what she says. And he's like, Oh, I went to a petting zoo and I fell in love with this one sheep and so then my parents bought it for me and let me bring it home, but then it wasn't housebroken. So then it had to go live on the farm. She's like, There's so many things that you've just said that are so unrelatable.

It's a very funny scene. And we got a fan question from Sheena P in Austin, Texas, who asked how much of the flossy conversation was improv. Well, I asked Chelsea. She said it was all pretty much scripted. She also said that her and Donald were just saying, because you know they're back shooting season two now.

They were just reminiscing about season one and saying that this day of shooting these driving scenes was one of their most fun days to shoot. Well, I had some questions for Dave Rogers about these driving sequences. I wondered where they filmed them because it looked like real farm community. And we also had a question from Caitlin P in Wakeman, Ohio, who said, was Mare actually driving? And here's what Dave had to say about all of that.

Dave said, okay, let me start by saying that the things we used to do in the office when we'd have the cast actually driving the cars is now a thing of the past. Lady, that's probably a good idea. I mean I can't believe I drove the car when Dwight ran me off the road. Yeah. I can't believe that Catherine and I were driving when I'm teaching Nellie to drive. And she's eating a salad. I I mean, what were we thinking? Yeah.

Craziness. Dave goes on to say, they actually don't let you free drive anymore, even if we have precision drivers on the road as background cars. We shot a lot of scenes on the office with cast driving, and I'm a fan of it as it looks real because it is real. But I think all television shows have stopped allowing that because of safety reasons.

So Mare was not really driving, but the car was also not on a trailer. Because that's the other way we would do it. Sometimes we weren't really driving, but they would put the car onto the back of this big trailer and they would tow it. So it looks like you're driving, but you're just being towed. Yeah. But you're really out on the road. Yeah.

But that was not the case here. No, Dave said because of the amount of driving scenes and the earlier sunset times that come with daylight savings, combined with a packed shooting schedule that included shooting numerous other scenes on the same day.

Dave described that there were these plates that literally wrapped around the car, the front sides and back. And there were also screens in the front of the windshield. And here's what that looks like, you guys. Jenna and I have both done this. Like I did a driving scene For the television show Better Things. And when they have plates around the car, it had like scenery on these big like

Screens. Was that your exper experience, Jenna? Well, he's calling them plates because that's the industry term, but I think it's more accurate to say they're like giant green screens that surround the car and then they project. The road into it, the moving road. Yeah. Onto these screens that surround the car. Yeah. There were like these huge.

Squares on stands that surround the car. Yeah. And then they can put whatever they want on those big squares to show wherever you are. So my driving scene was in a city, they're in the country. Yeah, I did this for that television show I did in London called You Me and the Apocalypse. And It was crazy because like in this episode, there's gonna be a moment where like Donald puts the window down, Ned puts the window down, and then like all this air comes in. And so they have

It's old timey fans. Yeah. And also like truly there's just some dudes in the back just like rocking the car. Yeah. I did find it kind of surreal because I'd only ever done driving scenes on the office where we were actually on the road. So the things I looked out the window were real trees I was passing and stuff like that.

And when I did my scene on Better Things, I'm in the backseat and we hit a bump. But it's kind of distracting because there's just like three men right outside. Yeah. Like kind of raising the car. Yeah. David said while there are pros and cons to using this technique, ultimately he felt like it looked pretty realistic and allowed them to have more shooting time. And that took away a lot of pressure for everyone. And I think you see them having fun. I think it really paid off. They tricked me.

So I watched it, and my question was the same where did they do these driving scenes? And when we got this information from Dave, I went back and rewatched it. I can't tell at all. Same. I literally thought they took a road trip to like some part of Northern California where it's farming community. Same. Well, I had another question for Dave about how they shot these scenes.

Especially now knowing that they weren't really on the road. You know, and my family is rewatching the office. It's my kids' first time seeing the show. It's been really fun, but something I'm noticing is how When we had driving scenes on the office, you know, we use the little lipstick cameras inside the car. Yeah. There is a real degrade in quality.

Like if you see us in the office and then it cuts to people in the car. I didn't really notice it before, like originally when I watched the show, but now in this rewatch, I'm really seeing it. And I asked Dave, like,

This looks really clear. Like I didn't, I'm not seeing that degrade in quality. Were you using lipstick cameras? Like, how did that work? And Dave said that the lipstick cameras that we used in the cars shooting the office, they did not have the same quality of resolution or lenses that our regular cameras had.

He said, but that was the style for documentaries back then. That was what happened on reality shows when you got in the car. And that they sort of saw that as part of the storytelling. They liked it. Yeah. They embraced it. He said, but now, you know, we're several years from the office ending, and he believes the documentary crew got some newer equipment. They still use lipstick cameras. But now lipstick cameras can get you a sharper image and listen to this.

They can be controlled remotely. You can zoom, you can pan. We couldn't do any of that stuff. Our lipstick cameras were fixed in one place. That's all you got. And you only saw what their lens saw. So he said they used uh three in the car, but they could pan, they could zoom. He said it was amazing. He said he positioned one as a wide shot and then he did two that kind of were cross-angled. He wanted to be able to see the actors, but he also wanted to see out the side windows.

Well, you got me. I thought it was amazing. Really well done.

Well now we go back to the Toledo truth teller and the bullpen. Oscar is really spinning out over being called an asshat and He has a rant. Jenna and I both texted Oscar Nunez about how amazing he is in this rant. I mean, eventually he's gonna come on and we're gonna talk to him all about it. But this was my chef's kiss moment of the episode. Yeah. I think we should hear it. Uh Oscar do you have the order number for

Such an unforgivably stupid word. Unforgivably another adverb. Okay, well it's a vile thing to call someone. But all I'm saying is how stupid it is. Because what? So in this scenario what? I'm a little hat worn by an ass? An ass wears a hat? Uh or am I an ass shaped hat? What do you see what I'm saying? I you just I wanna find them. I wanna find them and and and grab them and just Explain to them how funny it is. The whole scenario, how amusing it is to me. That's all. Because you can't because

It's computers and it's internet. So you can't tell them'cause you can't find them'cause there's no way. IP address. Yeah, it's traceable. I can track them. No, no, no. Oscar, look at me, dude. Revenge is a very dark road, and it can be. Surprisingly expensive. Okay, but if you do want to go down this road, you'd call IT and the number is 3271. Lady, I love the journey that Oscar goes on.

He's angry, but then he's like, But it's funny, it's funny to me. Yeah. And then also a little bit that this dates all of us were of a certain generation that you're like, but you can't find it. It's computers. Yeah. There's no way you'll ever know. And they're like, actually it's just you can track down the IP address.

We should mention that Oscar was nominated for a Critics Choice Award for the paper for Best Supporting Actor in a Comedy. And this is why, guys, this is it right here. Watch this scene. He does this very funny thing too, where he does like a little tiny hat like on his head. He's like, Am I an ass? Where's a hat? Like it's it's great. Oscar's just brilliant.

Well, why don't we take a break and when we come back, there is a spider in Mare's car. Sorry, I'm laughing about it. I know. Because it's so good. I watched this scene so many times. We need to break it down. We'll be back.

This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. You know, we are going to take a moment to celebrate women and all that they carry at work, in relationships, in families, and in the many roles they hold every single day. And we need to remind ourselves about how much we matter. And that therapy offers a space for us to take care of ourselves in the way we deserve. Therapy can also be a place to set boundaries and build confidence.

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Sign up and get ten percent off at better help dot com slash office ladies. That's better H E L P dot com slash office ladies. Did you know that Whole Foods is color coded now? If you go through the store and you see a yellow sign, yellow sign means sale. Oh. It means. Low price, same high quality, but it means sale. Huh. Mm-hmm. Well, I love Whole Foods Market when it comes time for easy dinners. Because they have so many things that are really great and I'm c sometimes on the rush.

Like when Josh isn't cooking then it's left to me. Yes. I just want to go in and grab a few things. They have burritos ready to go, soups, so much more. Oh, they have the best empanadas. You gotten their empanadas? I have. They're so good. Oh, and also for those weeknight shortcuts, you can go to the aisles that feature the three sixty-five brand rice, beans, chunky salsas. Voila, you could have a taco night like that. Whole Foods Market just makes it easy to eat well.

So try something new and stay on budget. Save on regional flavors at Whole Foods Market. Life with kids is Wildly unpredictable. Oh yeah. I mean, the only thing that's certain is that Something is gonna go not according to your plan. Like it doesn't matter how much you try to plan. It doesn't. There's just always gonna be chaos. And sometimes you need a little help. Like for example, it's the middle of the night. Your kid is sick. You can't leave the house to go get medicine or supplies.

Or maybe a working thermometer because oh my gosh, I can't believe the battery died in this one. And we don't have any batteries and I can't leave my kid who's running fever. Yes, but that's where you can use DoorDash. I mean we're so lucky we have DoorDash. I know.

In this day and age? I know. I mean there's all kinds of things. Real life needs real relief. And that's why DoorDash is there for whatever you need whenever you need it. We all know life gets crazy. DoorDash just helps bring a little order to it. Order now.

We are back and it's time for Around the Our first one is from Sarah T in Burlington, Wisconsin. Sarah wrote in and said, Every winter, my town puts an old car on the ice of the lake downtown. There is a contest for whoever can guess the day it falls through the ice. It just recently made its yearly appearance. Sam, so many questions. So many questions. I actually Googled this after I read it.

This is a whole thing. Yeah, this is right where I grew up. I remember this, yeah. They put all kinds of things on the ice. Yeah, they do refrigerators, all sorts of things. Mm-hmm. I saw one where they made a giant kind of like Look like a paper mache statue of a person. Like to see when he slowly sank in. When do they get the stuff out? I don't know that they ever do. No. They have to drag it out. Cars and refrigerators at the bottom of this lake. Look, I'm gonna assume so.

Oh no. I hope they drag him out. Who's gonna drag him out? Whose responsibility is that? I don't know. Also, the contest, what do you win? Just bragging rights? I'm gonna assume meat or beer or cheese. Well, Wisconsin. Sarah, we have questions. Sarah, we have questions. I also know winter really drags on up there, and you kind of need to make some entertainment for yourself. So yeah, I'm on board with this.

Next up is Kristen A. from Shenandoah, Iowa, who said, I run a small dealership in Southwest Iowa. We were just named the Iowa nomination for the National Independent. Quality Dealer Award. Hey, congratulations, Kristen. The winner will be announced in June at the National Convention. It's based on industry involvement, business operations, and community involvement. It's huge for our town and huge for women thriving in a male-dominated industry. So wish us luck. Good luck. Good luck, Kristen.

Next up, we have Beth S from Columbia, Maryland. Beth says, Proud mom, reporting from Howard County, Maryland. High school actor and avid The Office fan, Luke is now assistant stage manager of this spring's production of Cinderella the Musical. After over 10 years of acting in youth theater programs, Luke has decided to explore other aspects of theater and began training to be stage manager, acting as assistant stage manager this season.

He hopes to continue in this role as he continues high school with some acting should the perfect role come around. Luke, thank you so much for exploring stage management. It is such an important part. of the theater experience. I mean, you're the Kelly Cantley. Yes. Of the show. You're the first A D. You keep it going. You keep it scheduled. The props. You call the show. You call the show. None of it happens without you. Without a great stage management team. So I love it.

And also keep performing, Luke. Yeah. All right, our last around the town from Jenny L in Big Piney, Wyoming. Miss Camille R., a senior at Big Piney High School, became the first female and only second wrestler in school history to win the statewide wrestling tournament Ron Thon. In Wyoming, this means you are the best wrestler in your weight class in the whole state because they do not break into school-sized classifications.

Congratulations, Camilla. Yeah. What a huge accomplishment. Way to go. I loved hearing about these young people who are out there doing what they love and just crushing it. Thank you so much for writing in and sending your around the towns. It just makes me so happy and I think of my grandmother every time. Keep'em coming. You can find the folder for your submission on officeladies.com. Mm-hmm.

All right, let's get back to this paper breakdown, Angela. Like we said, we're gonna be back in the car with Mare and Ned. Yeah, it starts with Mare eating a bag of chips, which she then just throws over her shoulder into the backseat. And then Mare gets a call from a writer from Cleveland Today magazine who was very impressed by her article on the sewer clog. And while Mare is talking to this writer, she spies out of the corner of her eye a pretty big black spider.

Crawling alongside the window next to Ned. Yeah. So she kinda motions. She's like, Could you get rid of that spider? And he's like, Oh, he is completely unnerved by this spider. He does so many hijinks trying to basically get this spider into a cup. He's got like a piece of paper, he's got a old paper cup, he's trying to shove it in. And Mare's like, just smush it, just smush it. And Ned's like, I have a system.

And it's humane. He's gonna try to get the spider out the window. But when he tries to throw it out the window, it does that thing where like the web sort of connects to the cup and then it swings in his face. And it blows back into the car, but he can't find it. Is it on him somewhere? He panics. He like makes this noise, which is hilarious. He's like, ah, it's

All the while Mara is trying to have this very serious conversation with this writer and it is hilarious. We got a question from Christine Kay in Dublin, Ireland. Who said, hey ladies, I'd love to know everything about the spider in the car scene. Was the spider CGI? How was it choreographed? How much was improv? It just cracks me up every single time I watch it. The physical comedy is brilliant, Mr. Bean Level. Валви ас Дейв. Дейв said the spider was C Gi.

They rehearsed and guided the actors on exactly where the spider would be and what it would be doing. Dave said Donald just really sold it. He did. He sold getting hit in the face with it, trying to get it off his body. He said the visual effects team did an amazing job making it all feel real.

Dave said at one point in pre-production they did talk about having a real spider. They even talked about having a real spider walk across one of the lipstick cameras, but Dave said he thought it was kind of unnecessary. He was afraid that it wouldn't register as clearly. I mean, this is just reminding me of how when we did that fruit fly scene in the break room of the office, it was real.

It they brought in a fruit fly Wrangler. There's so many things I'm noticing that we did on the office. We were really driving. We brought actual fruit flies in. And now they can do it with all of this technology. I think about what Greg said when he was on our episode breaking down the booze cruise.

that they went to such effort to have this boat go out into the open ocean at night so you could see that we were on the ocean at night. And he said, it just looked black. Yeah, he said we could have very easily been on a side. Sound stage. And probably if we were on a soundstage, they could have made us look more like we were out at sea.

Yeah. Because you're right. I remember that. He said we pointed the cameras out and you could see nothing. It was just night. And then they wouldn't have lost four actors out to see as they were trying to get to shore. But then we wouldn't have had all these functions. We wouldn't have all the stories and people wouldn't have actually really gotten nauseous, which is what happened. Yes. Well I couldn't help but think

This is so random. But I was watching the scene and I'm cracking up about the spider and sort of like the two types of people, like Mara's like, just smush it. And he's like, no, I want to help it get back to nature. Lady. Josh and I went to look at tile. Okay. We have a leak in our son's bathroom. Yeah. In the shower. They're gonna have to bust open the tile. Anyway, we're gonna have to replace the tile. So we go to this tile store together. We open the door and walk in.

And there's like this kind of little lobby way, but only in the way that a tile store would do a lobby, which means that the lobby itself, the tile features all kinds of different tiles. Yeah, I know what you're talking about. So you walk in and There was a woman kind of sitting behind a computer in She's like, Do you guys have an appointment? And I was like, We do.

And we had just stepped in, we're like two steps into this tile store. And then this other woman walks past us in front of us. She's got a clipboard, she works there, and all of us at the same time Four strangers clocked. this huge spider crawling across their tile lobby. Mm-hmm. And this woman doesn't even skip a step. She just Past us and spoom, steps on it, smushes it as a big spider, it's a big smush. And then she just keeps on going. Leaves the spider carcass. And me and Josh are like, uh

Wait, is anyone gonna Do I what what do I what do we do here? Do we tidy up this thing? Do we just go about our day? It was so odd. It was so like just a weird moment between four strangers. I mean I would find that unnerving. I'm a scoop it into the cup person. I'm a scoop it into the cup person too. I'm like, let's try to like I was playing tennis the other day. There was a B on the tennis court. I'm like, wait, wait, wait.

I went and got a stick. I tried to get the bee to crawl on the stick, and then I took the bee on the stick over to the bushes. I mean, listen, we need to protect our bees and spiders. They're actually really important. You know, they eat mosquitoes. Well, thankfully Ned did not squish this spider because we would have missed out on this hilarious scene. Yeah.

Well, now I think maybe one of my favorite moments. I mean, there's so many in this episode. Next to the whole spider storyline, we're back with Esmeralda. She is gonna give Barry a gift, a quote unquote gift she found in the mail room. And really, this is her taking the advice of her psychic on how to break the curse. She has a talking head about all the steps she's taking to break this curse. And I really want us to hear it.

I'm trying to be rational and practical about this Barry situation. Of course, I sprinkled sold on my doorstep and on my windowsills. That did nothing. Now my psychic told me that there is another method that is scientifically proven that is going to break the incubus. Oh wow, that looks nice. I think you should wear it for seven days and seven nights without showering and then bury it under a red rock with a full moon?

So yeah, she's given Barry this necklace and it's got garlic in it. He just smells it, he's like, uh, and he tosses it in the trash. Esmeralda is so pissed, she walks past and she like throws a chair in the floor. She's like, damn it, Barry. This did make me be a lady that Googles. What'd you Google? Different ways to break a curse. Oh, what'd you find? Well, have you ever heard of any of these? I'm just gonna throw out a few.

the uncrossing bath. You take a bath with ingredients meant to uncross you. Such as salt, roost, sage, I don't know. Egg cleanse. You roll a raw egg over your body to absorb the negative energy, but then you have to dispose of it far from your home. Salt protection, as Morelda mentions this. You put salt under your doormats in the corners.

put it around your house to remove negative influences. Then there's protective herbs. Then there's a thing with a broom. Have you heard of this lady? You place a broom upside down behind the door to ward off negative visitors. I mean it goes on and on. There was a lot. Well, I also Googled. Oh. I was a lady who Googled. What did you Google? Well, I Googled how to rid yourself of an incubus. Well, that's very specific. That's good. I bet there's no broom involved. There isn't.

'Cause the thing is is, you know, all of these rituals like the ones you're naming, they're usually tied to a specific type of haunting or bad luck or issue. And there are very specific rituals to rid yourself of an incubus. So Esmeralda's psychic needed to get more specific with her. Yeah, because it doesn't include anything with garlic or Salt, right, or burying something under a red rock with a full moon. I don't know where her psychic got this.

If you find yourself with an incubus, everybody, here's what you can do. You can start with prayer. Exorcism. You can cleanse your space with sage, incense, holy water, or blessed salt. I guess the salt has to be blessed because this is a demon. Right. Incubus is a demon. So You've got to get spiritual. Correct. You can also take a bath in the Blessed Psalm.

Some folklore suggests that you should put a piece of cold iron, such as scissors or a knife, under your bed. I saw the iron thing in my list. Mm-hmm. Also place your shoes facing away from the door. Don't know why. Okay. This one I was confused about. I guess an incubus is afraid of their own reflection. So if you surround your bed with mirrors, it won't come into you at night while you're sleeping. That sounds kind of vampire y. I know.

Finally, use a dream catcher, but get a big one, a real big dream catcher, and maybe it'll catch the incubus before it can get into your dream. Have you ever done anything like this? I've saged my place before. I've done a sage. When I Bought my house. I walked around and I saged it. I still have a ghost, but she's friendly, so I'm okay with it.

I've had hippie woo-woo friends come over and sage my places for me. Yeah. Same, Sam. One of my friends came over when I bought my house because it's an older house. And she's like, well, first of all, we're going to sage it. So she did that. A week later, my mom and sister came out. They prayed over the house. So I've got everything covered. Yeah. Mm-hmm. That's good. Yeah. I think everywhere I live, I'm gonna do both things. Yeah.

Might as well. Might as well. Right? Good energy only here, people. Agree.

So we're back in the car, and Mayor is finishing talking to this writer from the Cleveland paper. It really bumps Ned because basically Mare says to the writer how hands-off Ned is as the editor, that she can just basically do whatever she wants. And he starts to say something, but then Mare is done with the conversation and hangs up the phone.

I mean, she's intending it as a compliment because the writer is like, I'm surprised that with your paper's affiliation with Softies that you were able to write this article. And she's like, oh no, no, no, my editor. He's very hands-off. She makes a comment where she's like, I mean, I think the readers read the article before he did. That's what really gets him. Yeah. Because then he doesn't seem hands off like letting his reporters really have integrity. Then it seems like he's just

half assing it. Yeah. So they stop at a diner on their way. They haven't gotten to the cult place yet. They stop at a diner and Ned decides, you know what, I want to review your questions. He's decided suddenly to take an interest in these questions she might ask. Because he had no interest before. Exactly. He was like, I trust you. Well now he gets out a pen, a red pen, and he's like marking up the document. Mm-hmm.

Mare does have a throwaway line here where she looks out the window and says, I think my dad took me to a pencil sharpener museum around here. Oh yeah. I mean, come on, a pencil sharpener museum? Wait, is that real? It's real Stop everything. It's real. Stop it. Yes, I had to be a lady who Googled again. This is so fun. There is a pencil sharpener museum in Logan, Ohio. And I went to the website, here's what it says.

Stop by the Hawking Hills Regional Welcome Center and visit one of the more unique museums you will see, the Paul A. Johnson Pencil Sharpener Museum. Reverend Paul Johnson began his collection more than 20 years ago. It has over thirty four hundred pencil sharpeners. Featured in national magazines, it's reputed to be the largest collection in America. And recently they added Frank Parade's collection. And with those combined collections, there's an estimated 5,000 pencil sharpeners.

And there's pictures you wouldn't believe. the different types of pencil sharpeners. It's fascinating to me. I am actually feeling angry right now that I am fifty two years old almost, and I'm only just learning about this pencil sharpener museum. Like what? I need to go there, like soon. Do you love a pencil sharpener?

No, I love museums of tiny things like pencil sharpeners. Well, I love pencil sharpeners. The randomness of this collection. There's pictures on the website, you guys. I'll share it in stories. Well now Ned and Mare are gonna arrive at the Fertile Soil Farm Collective and the camera crew can't come with them. They have to stay back. Yeah, Mare says, quote, the cult dude is kind of secretive in an on brand way. So they walk up, the cameras stay back.

But you can see people are all kind of doing yard work. They're raking and they're all wearing these red ponchos. Yeah, matching ponchos. I noted that Ned still has his yellow backpack from when we first met him in the first episode. I thought that was a nice callback. Um, I have a missed opportunity alert here. Okay. How great would it have been if just one of the people in a red poncho was Creed? Yes. Come on, right, Sam? Thank you.

Just yeah. We don't hear from him. Still with the beard from the last episode. Just a quick push in. Yeah. He doesn't even have to say anything. He's just raking some leaves with the other people. Exactly. Yeah. Uh That would have been great. I asked Dave Rogers, where did you shoot this?

And he said it was the magic of filmmaking. They shot it on the universal back lot at a place that was a house that had some good trees and some good brush around it. He said the art department did a great job making it look like a farm. And I can't believe that this was shot on the lot. This is like just blowing my mind. I know we're kind of a broken record here, but you guys, when we went to Shroot Farms, we went to a frickin' farm an hour outside of LA.

We had to have a rattlesnake Wrangler because there were rattlesnakes everywhere. We had to leave our houses at four thirty in the morning. I mean, I guess that's what you get when you shoot on a big time real deal old Hollywood lot, which is amazing. They have all these different nooks and crannies that look like New York City or an old town square or a farm.

And we just shot in this tiny sound stage in Van Ice. So we had to travel. If we had to show any part of the world, we had to get out. We had to load up in a van and go on the road. And watch out for rattlesnakes. Yep. Or a bee in John's eggs.

Correct. Well, back at The Truth Teller, Oscar announces he has discovered who the troll is. I guess he called the IT department after all. He did. Guess what? It's coming from inside the building. It's coming from Anne Putnam's office. Uh-huh. Marv's assistant and sister-in-law Anne. They cannot believe this. But Oscar has a talking head that's great where he says it makes sense. Let's hear it. I see it often in people over fifty.

They get trapped in the year that they join Facebook. It's it's as if the technology sends their brain into shock and their online personalities get frozen in time. So Anne is basically a snarky millennial. Trapped in the body of a boomer. That is such a funny description. I think there's some real truth in it. There might be. And look, I know my sister Janet listens to the podcast, but Janet, the emojis you use

Very telling to me when you started having like the smartphone thing. Why? I only use a handful of emojis. And I think it's because early on there were only a few to choose from. And now there's so many. I only use face palm, heart, and like the person who's crying while they laugh. See, I think that shows when you joined. The sort of smartphone thing, right? Sam, what about you? I am partial to the guy giving the salute.

Oh it's a good I've heard your sentence and I want to not Give input to the conversation, wrap it up, emoji. I I use the smiley face that has the like straight line smile of all teeth. Like Oh yeah. Yeah. Angela, I'm constantly using that one because I always feel that way. Yeah.

Or I use the lady in the red dress running. Yeah, you love that one. I love that one. I think it's just like I'm a badass, I'll run in my dress. And isn't she dancing? I think she is. But like my sister Janet will do like Like the hand emojis that's like thumbs up, then I love you. Then peace, fingers, and then like a hamburger, a glass of wine, champagne, things. Well the thumbs up just reads as passive aggressive. That's like texting posts.

I was just reading how people want to cancel the thumbs up because people think it's passive aggressive and I was like, oh no, that's my most common one. Oh, I do thumbs up all the time. Me and my dad wouldn't talk if we didn't do thumbs up emojis. Oh yeah. It's a v it's a perfect dad and son emoji. I'll give you that. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know, maybe it's time to throw some new ones in our emoji Resume guys. You know what? I wanna put this out there in our office ladies text thread.

Feel free to try on new emojis, no judgment. Yeah. It's our safe space to try new things. I can't wait. I can't wait. Well, now we're gonna go back to a fertile soil.

They're leaving, they're getting in their car, and Ned has decided they're not a cult. Mayor thinks they are a cult. Mayor's like, you didn't let me ask any hard hitting questions. And they get into car and they're just annoyed with each other. Yeah. And this back and forth about whether or not they're a cult or not follows them back onto their drive home. Mm-hmm.

It did make me wonder, could the right cult get you? This was a question Ned asks early on. Right. Because I kind of joined a cult once. On accident. And this is at being your friend all these years, I want to say this is really on brand. I think when people first meet us. Sam, maybe you would think I'm the one that would fall prey to a cult. No, not at all. Actually, Jenna.

Well, this is also how I accidentally joined a call girl ring. Yes. Because I thought I had joined a a singing group. Yes. You're oddly like very susceptible to these groups. I am. Yeah. And you're such a critical thinker. I know. And yet I also believe a ghost lives in my closet, lady. I don't know.

Well lady, if you ever get sucked in by a cult, I'd come and get you. Thank you. I know that you will. You're welcome. That's best friendship. Mm-hmm. Well now as they're arguing and driving down the road, Mary gets a flat tire. Yes.

They're gonna have to change this tire. Mare is gonna change it. Ned's just like sitting in the back of the trunk. Like, do you know how hard it is to ratchet up your car in the first place and he's just sitting in the back? Oh yeah. What the heck, Ned? What the heck, Ned? I do have a wardrobe catch here. What is it? 15 minutes, 25 seconds. I absolutely loved the boots that Mare's wearing. So I had to Google them. I went onto one of the websites I use to check costume and wardrobe stuff.

ShopierTV.com says they are the six-inch classic mock women's short boot in black boundary leather by Red Wing. Oh, are they expensive? They retail for$319.99. But they are really cool looking. You wanna see? Yeah. Oh, those are super cool. I know. Yeah.

Those are really cool. I know. I kind of want a pair now. If I were Chelsea, I would ask to take those home at the end of the season. I hope she gets them. Well, I asked Dave Rogers where they shot this, and guess what? Also on the Universal Backlot. They found a street on the lot just right around the corner from that house that was being the farm.

And I mean, this is crazy. This street on the universal back lot had a hill because Mare's gonna get mad at Ned and she's gonna roll the tire down this hill and make him chase after it. I can't believe that was on the universal background. I can't either. That lot is huge though. It goes on and on. Well, this is true. Well now here's a moment of truth. Oscar and the rest of the gang are gonna go confront Anne about her snarky comments. Mm-hmm.

And the character of Anne could win a little Oscar here. Yes, she really could. She's like, What? Who would do such awful things? And then she's like, Oh, dang it. Marv has told me I need to set a password, and I just thought, who would ever just come on my computer and do something like that? I just feel horrible. And they're just like, Oh no, it's okay. It's okay. I know she's like, they shouldn't give people my age these machines. Yeah.

She completely convinces them that she had nothing to do with it. And they all leave. And then she has this talking head where she says, you know what? Whoever the troll is probably just wants to hold the truth teller to a high standard of quality. Marv has invested a lot of money, so they need to make sure it's awesome sauce.

So it is Anne. It is Anne. Do you think she'll keep doing it? Yeah, I do. I do too. Well, Ned and Mare have changed their tire and they're stopping at this diner again on their way home. Ned tries to make a peace offering to Mayor. He gets her this ice cream float, but he only buys one and it's only for Mayor. And so they get in this crazy, weird fight. About who should eat this ice cream soda.

and go back and forth about it. It's very childish. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Dave shared that there was a fun bit of improv during this scene that he wished would have made it in. There was this moment, I guess, where Donald improvised actually eating the ice cream float. Like he's like, fine, Mayor, I'll eat it. And he downs it in like four spoonfuls. And then Mayor is shocked. And then he continues to try to make his case with her, but he has to stop because he has brain freeze.

Dave said it was such good improv. He thought it was so funny. He put it in his director's cut, but ultimately it got taken out. Aww. But he loved it. Maybe they'll get to do super fan versions of the paper. Super fan versions of the peacock version? Yes. They can add even more. Yeah.

Well, Ned and Mare are still bickering and they're back in the parking lot now. They're gonna get in the car to drive back home. When Ned gets a phone call, it's Detrick calling to tell them they were nominated for the Ohio Journalism Awards. Yes. Mare is nominated for her Softies Clog's Toledo story, but the entire paper is up for the overall excellence in journalism. And they are just elated. Yes, they do a little happy dance in the parking lot.

So I guess all is forgiven there. I mean, this is very exciting. Big news. Mm-hmm. And you know, the next episode, the season finale, is the Ohio Journalism Awards. We're gonna see how this all plays out.

But this episode is gonna end with Esmeralda walking into the office. And she just walks over to Barry's desk and she just gives him a big kiss on the lip. Yes. And then she says this whole speech where she's like, You have been kissed on the seventeenth day of the month. I command you to forsake me. Set me free. Set me free. Set me free. And then she's like, The spell is broken. And Barry's like okay. I loved it. One last thing I want to share from Dave Rogers. I thought this was so sweet.

He said one of the highlights of the week of him directing this episode was that they got some very extra special VIPs that came to set. Jenna, you mentioned this. These are Dave's words, not ours. He said the lovely Jenna Fisher and Angela Kinsey, who I might add, got a huge round of applause from the casting crew when they stepped onto the set.

Some of the cast told me later they were both excited and nervous to meet you. But it was so nice having you guys there, and those of us who worked on the office like Greg, Rusty, Kelly, Kaisha, Veda, Steve, and Lori and Sergio and of course Oscar were really thrilled and so happy to see you guys. Aw. That was really special. We both teared up. It was It's such a great group of people. Yeah.

Well, you guys, thank you so much for listening to today's episode and for sending in your questions, your comments, your chit-chats, your around the towns. And of course, a huge thank you to Dave Rogers for giving us behind the scenes details. Dave would like you to know that the season nine superfan episodes of The Office are up on Peacock right now. You know, he works so hard on them. And we're gonna talk more about those in a few episodes, but they're really special.

And of course, a big thank you to Chelsea Fry. Oh my God, we loved watching you in this episode. Thanks for always texting us back when we DM you. All right, everyone. We love ya. And we will see you next week. And we should mention that next week we'll be breaking down the finale episode of the paper with Chelsea Fry in the studio. Yeah, so be sure to join us for that one. We love you guys. See you next week.

Thank you for listening to Office Ladies. Office Ladies is a presentation of Odyssey and is produced by Jenna Fisher and Angela Kinsey. Our senior producer is Matt Beagle. Our audio engineer is Sam Kiefer, and our associate producer is Ainsley Bubaco. Our theme song is Rubber Tree by Creed Bratton.

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