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RSS'How I Met Your Mother': The difference between peanut butter and jam
There were several lessons learned tonight on "How I Met Your Mother." They went from the basic (make yourself indispensible at work) to the even more basic (don't hire an assistant whom your roommate will want to sleep with, it'll upset your best friend who also wants to sleep with your roommate).
Why would Marshall ever think that keeping his job had anything to do with hard work? I think just about any one of us could have told him that. Barney's advice on that score was actually not bad -- come up with a hook, do something special.
Apparently some positions at companies are universal -- there's always a toy guy, a food guy, a creepy backrub guy. I was moderately surprised that the show opted to not come up with some crazy position for Marshall, instead making him the fantasy sports guy. But beyond that, how did Goliath not already have a fantasy sports guy? If this economic crisis has taught me anything, it's that bankers are gamblers. Combining that fact with the plain truth of fantasy sports -- it's all about gambling (the guy who runs the fantasy sports leagues is the same guy who runs the NCAA tournament), so it seems like the position should have already been filled at Goliath. How wasn't it? One of those bankers had to have worked out that they could have bundled their bad bets into some form of derivative and gotten federal bailout money for the toxic assets, right?
I guess the bailout money may still have been available to them after handing their cash to Marshall. Giving Marshall that sort of money to walk around the city with has to be considered some sort of toxic asset, doesn't it?
Come on, I kid. I kid because I care about Marshall, and one of the reasons I care about Marshall is that Marshall cares about everyone else in the group. Marshall even cares about Barney, as evidenced by his hiring PJ away from Ted to run the fantasy sports division of Goliath.
Speaking of PJ, I'm not quite sure why Ted got himself an assistant at all. I do however know that watching Ted with PJ, I realized that I need one too. I do think that I'd rather take Barney's tack in looking for help though -- if I have an assistant working 10 feet from my bedroom door it's going to be a woman. If it wasn't, my roommate may end up hooking up with the hot assistant, and as my roommate is my wife, that's just not acceptable. I know that Ted and Robin aren't together anymore, but surely Ted could have worked out that he wasn't going to be happy with Robin getting together with his assistant, and just as surely he ought to have figured out that was coming down the line.
The person that took the whole PJ situation the hardest though was, as you may have expected, Barney. What with his amorous feelings for Robin (Cobie is clearly terribly pregnant and they didn't do a very good job of hiding that at all tonight), he was not happy with the idea that Robin had someone to have sex with at the apartment all the time. As Robin has some very guy-like qualities, Barney knew that he could never compete with sex already being available in the apartment -- what guy is going to go out and look for something different when they already have that?
So, good for Marshall, he fixed Barney's problem, made himself likable at the office, and didn't have to do any more work for the fantasy league by the end of the night. Definitely an "all's well that ends well" deal for him.
Quotes and peanut butter:
- The quote of the night went to Barney. He said it to Ted upon learning that PJ was a guy (after his initial rant about that being the case) -- "PJ is going to be getting a very confusing card in the mail, along with a garment that he should by no means wear for three days and then mail back to me."
- I actually had several choices for best lines tonight, so I'm going to give one more, it was said by Marshall to Barney --"Oh I have that thing that makes me a guy... maybe even a guy and a half." (The newspaper guy was a close runner-up for a quote too).
- Finally, the difference between peanut butter and jam. I looked that joke up after they refused to give us the punch line. Lily was totally right to disappear for four weeks. I saw two endings to that joke, and neither was remotely acceptable in polite company. I can't even link to the answers here. The joke was however a great way to make Lily appear briefly in the show before letting her take off.
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Solid episode I must say. It was full on the heart of the groups and on laughs. So many truths. There is always some guy in any work setting that has food all the time or is always showing some random YouTube clip.
I have to say that I'm that guy for a LOT of different things. Had to diversify being multiple guys just to stay employed!
The Peanut Butter and Jam joke thing was a clever way to send Lilly off for Alyson Hannigan's maternity leave, but despite a mostly solid episode, it felt a little lacking without her!
Marshall on the street was cracking me up - the baby knows, the baby knows - then his Pee-Wee Herman-esque flight (pegged by my wife).
Ted's at-home company complete with ***itant had echoes of both "Seinfeld" (when Kramer "hires" an intern, a theme currently being explored on Rules of Engagement as well) and "Mad About You" (Paul and Jamie arguing when she tries to start an ad agency from home and he needs to watch TV for a do***entary and Ted's afternoon meditation walks that were reminiscient of the walk Paul would make on his birthday.), not to mention, though it is unintentional, the current arch on the Office of Michal Scott forming his paper company ( both even had a similar 2nd guessing declaration - Micheal's Peanut Butter and Tuna comment and Ted's If I don't start I haven't failed statement). Even the back-rub guy is a reflection of a minor character on Scrubs - Jimmy the Overly Touchy Orderly - who is played by an actor, Taran Killiam, who incidentilly (IMDB is a great thing)has appeared in 3 episodes of HIMYM and apparantly is the father of Cobie Smlders baby.
I cant wait to find out what Lily's been doing in those four weeks. The writers love to bring back storylines that were skipped.
Did anyone else think the actress who playes Robin is pregnant? With the oversided tops and the large handbags she hid behind it appeared to me she might just be ..
Of COURSE she's pregnant!
Where have you been darcijj?
I had never heard of that peanut butter and jam joke before either. After looking it up, I wonder why the guys found it so funny. I didn't find it offensive, I just thought it was a lame joke and the sorta thing immature 14 year olds come up with. For those unfamilar with it, basically it's about about how a guy can't peanut butter his um, unit, up a woman's behind (whereas he can jam his, well, you get it).
"Cobie is clearly terribly pregnant and they didn't do a very good job of hiding that at all tonight". Are you sure this was the best choice of phrase? She's not even that far along. Next time try "awesomely pregnant". Uncle Barney approved.