Books, Books, Book

Best Company moments

1. Season Seven, Episode Two: Counseling

When they all support and try to help Dwight with the mall fiasco even before they knew what happened. After first storming in and demanding everyone “Boycott the Steamtown Mall” and then again when help him prepare to Pretty Woman the salesclerk (per Kelly’s suggestion).

Kelly “You shirt and tie are disgusto-barfo”

Oscar “Maybe not so monochromatic, not so matching”

Ryan, Kelly, Pam and then Ryan again “The glasses are a little….I liked them…I thought they were kinda cute…yeah I liked them too”

Darryl "Say Stuff like ‘good morning, good afternoon. People appreciate that’” Darryl

Andy “If someone offers you a cocktail, accept, but keeps your wits about you” Andy

Angela “Please and Thank you go a long way”

2. Season Seven, Episode Twenty-Two: Goodbye Michael

When they all sing Rent, and calculated the actual minutes (9,986,000)  that he had been at the company

3. Season Five, Episode Fourteen: Stress Relief Part 1

When, more than those you’d expect, began dancing to them singing ‘staying alive’ to know when to pump for CPR. First Andy joining in singing, then Kelly dancing, Phyllis and Creed bopping their heads, then Michael stops with the CPR and gets up to also dance as does Andy later dancing with the instructor and even Meredith and Dwight bopping their heads as well.

4. Season Eight, Episode Five: Garden Party

When they all come together to cheer Andy up after the Garden party; even to where they ignore him as he tries to leave and apologize with Darryl asking him he wants a “Cheeseburger or Hamburger” and Oscar calling him “Nard-dog” before tossing him a beer.

5. Season Seven, Episode Seven: Christening

When they all shit on the churchgoers at the Christening; they are their own type of family

Ryan “Teach for America girls are way hotter—but their nuts”

Phyliis “Who takes a kid to Mexico”

Stanley” I would run to Mexico if that’s where the sandwiches are”

Dwight “You wanna know my 11th Commandment, I will not be undersold”

Andy “What if the Moon was your car and Jupiter was your hairbrush”

Ending with half-assed claps and Ryan playing with his cup

6. Season Six, Episode Fifteen: Sabre

When they work together to repackage the Sabre box

7. Season Seven, Episode Nine: WUPHF.com

When they figured out the server password first thinking of things topical for when it was set, IT guys, and then that it made Michael laugh when he heard it, but Pam got offended.

8. Season Seven, Episode Six: Costume Contest

“Is there no limit to what Stanley won’t notice?”

Jim’s OJ wasn’t his hot coffee

Kevin dressed up as Phyllis

Andy naked except for his tie

The computer monitor being replaced by a cardboard box with a picture on it

Michael with fake teeth

The conference meeting having everyone but him sitting backwards and the meeting talking about the projections on Jupiter

Pam with a mustache

and Dwight with a pony

 Except—he notices the clock is slow and it’s after 5pm

9. Season Nine, Episode Eight: The Target

When Pete, Kevin, Erin, Meredith, Creed, Nellie and Darryl all work together to build the complaint tower and support Pam getting a complaint

10. Season Nine, Episode Eighteen: Promos

When they realize the camera crew followed them more than they realized, and all looked at the camera simultaneously

Angela Martin

Angela’s Best Moment: Season Three, Episode Thirteen: The Return

When she invites Oscar to join the Party Planning Committee. I believe she does this as part of an olive branch because she feels bad about what happened with Oscar on some level, but also what happened to Dwight and that maybe overall there are some changes she needs to make.

Angela’s Worst Moment: Season Five, Episode Three: Business Ethics

When during the Business Ethics meeting she tells everyone how she once reported Oscar to the I.N.S. That’s bad enough, but to follow up with she’s glad she did it—not okay.

Angela’s Best Line: Season Three, Episode Twenty-One: Women’s Appreciation

 “Sometimes, the clothes at GapKids are too flashy. So I’m forced to go to the American Girl Store and order clothes for large colonial dolls.”

Angela’s Most Memorable Moment: Season Three, Episode Eighteen: The Negotiation

When she goes around asking various coworkers about what happened with Roy and ‘the fight’, getting people to tell her what Dwight did…because it turns her on.

Clark Green

Clark’s Best Moment: Season Nine, Episode

When Dwight tells him “ The bubble wrap is the only thing that is stopping his suit from getting wrinkled. These meetings are all about presentation”

And he responds “that’s actually really smart—God, if only there was any other use or situation for that kind of knowledge”

Clark’s Worst Moment: Season Nine, Episode Two: Roy’s Wedding

When he uses Erin’s gullibility to get her to his apartment alone for a “reporting job”

Clark’s Best Line: Season Nine, Episode Eleven: Suit Warehouse)

When describing Jan’s sexual appetite “Women reach their sexual peak at whatever age Jan as last week. I mean, if it was….like making love with a wild animal. But not like a cougar, like you might think.. It was…uh…like a swarm of bees. Bees that just find something wrong with every hotel room”

Clark’s Most Memorable Moment: Season Nine, Episode One: New Guys

When he walks right across the slack rope

Roy Anderson

Roy’s Best Moment: Season Two, Episode Fifteen: Boys and Girls

When he went up to Jim, said he heard the rumor about Jim ‘having a crush on Pam’ and that it was no big deal because he knows he’s a good guy and it was a long time ago.

Roy’s Worst Moment: Season Two, Episode Sixteen: Valentine’s Day

When Pam tell Roy that she is upset that he didn’t get her anything for Valentine’s Day “Well, Valentine’s Day isn’t over. Let’s get you home, and you are gonna get the best sex of your life”

Roy’s Best Line: Season Three, Episode Eighteen: The Negotiation

When he gets upset that Pam won’t try to date Jim after they break up again

“Wait a minute, you broke off our wedding for the guy--You mean you’re not even gonna try to go out with him? I don’t get you Pam”

Roy’s Most Memorable Moment: Season Two, Episode Twenty-Two: Casino Night

When he hired Kevin to play the wedding band after seeing Kevin lose at Casino night.

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

Any possibility of Harry having a nice life, died, mercilessly, with this book, starting with him again not being to just be on the sidelines and ending with the full return of Voldemort. Okay, so it starts off with a horrible scene but actually the beginning is quite lovely as Harry writes to Sirius for help because he finally has someone he can write to with his problems that’s like a parent and then following the silliness of the Weasleys sending a letter with about 10 thousand stamps (why did no one give them basics after the phone call and really, Muggle Studies should be mandatory for everyone, is there really that little contact) and then of course, the Quidditch World Cup (see—Muggles).

But quickly the main themes of Harry being cursed (seriously—why did he keep going back) and teenage drama (Ron v. any and all sensibility) took over, but with some new dimensions. This was the beginning of true social justice for Hermione, something that she would stick with the rest of her life, and I love how it a) was for those who weren’t fighting for themselves, and b) wasn’t based on blood status. The choice and dedication she had to fight for equality and for others made sense as it was an extension from her fight the year before for Buckbeak and wasn’t for her, but something for others that was not related to school, but important, and a part of her and would’ve come out eventually, one way or another. In relation to the parallels created, the introduction of Rita Skeeter, her rumors, and the brainwashing of the media we later also see in Year Five are important parallels to our non-magical world. This extends to how we shouldn’t always trust those we believe we should and we should remain skeptical of those we don’t truly know (Alastor Moody, Lugo Badman, Molly Weasley with Hermione and Rita and others). These are lessons that we understand adults have not all mastered. Additional lessons can also be shown in the three tasks. The First Task reminds us to be creative with your knowledge as Krum hadn’t thought of summoning a broom to help him. The Second and Third Task make me think of moral fibre and compassion, and to not let the competition take over what you know is right. 

This book was long, and had a lot, but most importantly it stood as the midpoint, the break between young Harry Potter and older Harry Potter as the coming years would get even darker, and the lessons he learned this year and previously (along with the friendships he gained) would be more valuable in coming times than expected. Unrelated, the beginning chapter of this was so anti-Harry Potter, it had no magic, was complete mysterious and dark but not overdone, it was beautiful and sucked me in so much; truly showed how JK Rowling was a brilliant writer even outside the magical world she created. Also, would’ve loved a scene with Hermione showing Draco she captured Skeeter, once again showing how completely brilliant she is in having figured it out, also, badass!!

Born a Crime

Trevor Noah’s (current host of The Daily Show) autobiography Born a Crime about an illegal child born in South Africa during apartheid is not the traditional rags-to-riches story you would expect. He does express breaking out of apartheid and the circle of ‘black payment’ but all before the success of who he is today, actually in only one sentence, as part of background information, does he mention his comedy, his touring and this is all before he came to the states or even left South Africa.  His story of rags-to-riches focuses on the better life he got in South Africa thanks to the willfulness of his mother and some random luck. 

There are a few reasons I love this book so much, for starters, I hear Trevor Noah in every word written, I'm not reading the book, I’m hearing him tell me his story and while watching The Daily Show provides his voice and talking mannerisms the actual art of showing and not telling, portraying his humanness in the story, that’s the beautiful part and it’s not because of The Daily Show. Giving a personal and historical understanding of his experience growing up under apartheid is great for all the obvious reasons: the picture he paints, the life different from ours that he introduces us to, but what he does so seamlessly is showing us our stories within his. 

Once I got old enough I knew I was privileged. Not from the specifics of being white or an upper-middle-class background--everyone I knew was like that, but I did understand that growing up in the states that I always had food and I’d go to college. Growing up Trevor shows us that while very different, that he can show us his world of apartheid and our world all at once, the specifics are different, but the stories are the same: racism, fear, fake personas, heartbreak, domestic violence

He brings us into the understanding of how again were just different types of toasted bread (because really, races aren’t even different types of skin, it’s literally just different levels of shading, this is all so ridiculous--but anyway), how some of us were in to level seven and others 4 and others only level one but we’re all still bread. 

Snarkiest Lines

1. Season Two, Episode Ten: Christmas Party (Ryan)

“What line of work are you in, Bob?”

2. Season Three, Episode Eleven: Back from Vacation (Angela)

“Did you try the petting zoo?”

3. Season Three, Episode Twenty-Three: The Job (Stanley)

“The same as the ratio of unicorns to leprechauns.”

4. Season Two, Episode Six: The Fight (Pam)

“Could you practice on the forms?”

5. Season Six, Episode Three: The Promotion (Oscar)

“Where would Catholicism be without the Popes?”

6. Season Six, Episode Five: Mafia (Dwight)

"That’s why they call it Murder, not Muckduck”

7. Season Four, Episode One: Fun Run (Jim)

“One day Michael came in complaining about a speed bump on the highway. I wonder who he ran over then”.

8. Season Three, Episode One: Gay Witch Hunt (Stanley)

“I got them a toaster. They called off the wedding and gave the toaster back to me. I tried to return the toaster to the store, and they said they no longer sold that kind of toaster. So now my house has got two toasters”.

9. Season Five, Episode Four: Baby Shower (Dwight)

"Jan had the baby, and Michael wasn’t there to mark it. So the baby could be anybody’s. Except Michael’s”.

10. Season Two, Episode One: The Dundies (Pam)

“You know what they say about a car wreck, where it’s so awful you can’t look away? The Dundies are like a car wreck that, you wanna look away, but you have to stare at it because your boss is making you”

Bellatrix Lestrange

It is not needed to be said that one should not have Bellatrix as a role model in regards to her morality; however, unlike other characters, she was a force of nature, an exemplary, strong and unique female character full of traits to be honoured and contradictions worth exploring.

First, as one of the top three hated characters and one of the two most hated women in the series, I thought it would be important to note how Bellatrix is different, and much better, than Umbridge. On the surface they would seem very similar, both elitist and cruel, but in reality, Bellatrix was so much more. With no limit of her devotion to Voldemort or the cause, she consistently held him in high esteem and never denounced him, even once captured and in Azkaban. Umbridge, on the other hand, more was interested in the power and the ability to put other beneath her than the actual belief that they were less than her, as we see with her father who she was ashamed of even though he was a wizard because he didn’t have enough status in the wizarding world.

What’s also interesting about Bellatrix, is how much her life is based on emotions, and how with her it is a very weakening characteristic. She was definitely the only person he came closest to loving and respecting, and had he felt a need for an equal or partner it definitely would have been her, but while her emotions and darkness made her eviler, they also are part of what scared him. An example is how both Voldemort and Bellatrix torture Harry and Neville; Voldemort is trying to gain information, power, immortality, but what is Bellatrix gaining? She is just being cruel, trying to show off. She didn’t see Neville as an equal, so why bother trying to egg him on and best him. Unfortunately the emotions also hurt her relationship with him because she was just so desperate to be even more to him than she already was, she wanted to be the one to kill Harry, was ashamed and would agonize when Voldemort mentioned her blood traitor sister and half-breed niece (btw, how the heck did they know who got married to whom and had a kid, this is some fourth-wall BS), and he would dismiss her constantly—even if not as obnoxious as he did with Pettigrew or Malfoy and whether this helped drive her mad or just made her more sadistic, I don’t think it did anything for their bond except increase her usefulness to him.

While evil and repulsive, she was a very strong character with depth. As she explained with Harry and the Cruciatus Curse—you have to mean it. She was honourable in that she didn’t back down from her beliefs even when it came to turning on family (I wonder what she would have done if she lived in regards to Narcissa) and that she demanded your attention and respect as someone who was brilliant and talented

JK Rowling

Harry Potter and the Sorcerors Stone, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Harry Potter and the Half-Blooded Prince, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I literally grew up with the release of the books and films. From September 1st 2018 to midnight, July 21st, 2007 I grew up with Harry, Ron and Hermione. But even 20 years later children and adults around the world are growing up with them, learning from the characters, the books, the films, their friends, their families, their teachers, and their stories. 

We have learned about compassion, friendship, empathy, inner strength, how to persevere; we have learned about activism, to fight against inequality, to fight for more than just ourselves. It has been scientifically concluded that these stories have increased people’s humanity and lessened the possibility of hate from taking over. The generation that grew up with these stories, those who read them to us and those who have read them since believe and have a new understanding about those around them that aren’t like themselves due to religion, race, politics, economics, immigration and all the other things that make us beautifully different. What we learned from Harry Potter, what we learned from you over these past 20 years today (in the states), in these 19 years and counting, thank you JK Rowling. Thank you for the world you created in these stories, and so much more

Thank you