Fart Attack And Proposal

Parks and Recreation, S05E05

Jerry had a heart attack, and Leslie got together a garage sale and auction to raise some money for his bills.  She got a little too enthusiastic about the fundraising after learning that Ben was thinking about starting a new campaign project in Florida.  Ron and Andy joined Diane and her kids for trick-or-treating, but things went badly when Diane had to leave them alone with Ron.

I like how they downplayed Jerry's heart attack with him farting so much you wondered as Tom had said if Jerry had eaten farts for lunch.  I liked how Tom was frustrated that the doctor refused to label Jerry's condition as a "fart attack."  It was also nice to see everyone wanting to help Jerry instead of just making fun of him as they usually do (I mean, he's sort of the Charlie Brown of the group, but he's a sweet man).  

Jerry's hospitalization also worked to expose Leslie's insecurity about her future with Ben when she saw that Jerry's plans for the future would no longer be able to go as he planned with his medical bills and possible further health complications.  I love how Leslie tries to deal with her own problems by trying to fix someone else's problem.  Her desperation to fix everything (which I suppose in her mind would have made things magically better with Ben) even led her to try and sell Ann at the auction.  I really loved that part because although two attractive guys bid on her, one really creepy guy with a tank top outbid the others and had unpleasant ideas on how they'd spend their date.

I was really starting to feel so bad for Leslie, especially since she was trying to live through Jerry of all people, until Ben suddenly showed up and proposed!  I did not see that coming!  They totally surprised and delighted me.  It was so sweet and I couldn't be happier to know that they are engaged now.  I don't know if that means he won't take the job in Florida, but I at least know that Leslie will probably shift her focus to planning the most ridiculous wedding ever.  She'll probably spend the most time on figuring out a cake (or I think a sweets bar would really suit her) that has enough sugar to put someone in a coma.  I'm so excited to see their wedding (if we get to see it--I'd be so disappointed if not)!

Ron's story was a little sad too because he just isn't good with kids at all (although Andy is like a huge kid, so he sort of has experience with them).  I was worried that he was going to cast aside Diane for a moment there.  I'm not ready to see Lucy Lawless leave just yet.  And somehow she looks pretty damn good in a ridiculous princess outfit.  Haha.  But I kept wondering what the hell Ron was dressed as?  Was he trying to be one of the dwarfs from Snow White?

One of my favorite things about that story was at the very end when Ron retook the girls for trick-or-treating about a week later.  He just asked people to get something sweet from their house and give it to the girls and then slipped them some money for their trouble.  That's pretty damn sweet.  And even though they were getting things like cookie dough, I'm sure it made their day.

There were also a couple of good lines from this story.  Andy supplied one of them:

[Andy] 7:34 p.m. Man dressed as nerd. Lady dressed as crazy witch.

[Man] Neither of us is in costume.

Ron's best line was when one of the girls told him she needed to use the bathroom and he replied:

I have no idea what to do about that.

Donna also had a good line from when she was attending the garage sale.  An annoyed Twitter follower complained about her tweets on the movie.  She told him to unfollow her if he didn't like what she was saying (why do people on Twitter complain so much about tweets they chose to read by their own will??) and had this to say when he wondered what she was doing on her phone:

I'm live tweeting this dumbass conversation.

I would love to do that to someone if I had the skills to type that fast on my phone.  Because she didn't even make eye contact with that moron.

Great episode.  A lot of good things happened (one that I didn't mention being Tom's possible new business venture).  The best, of course, is that Ben and Leslie will one day be married!  Yes!  I couldn't bear to see them split apart by his job or her job--they just have to make it work somehow.  I hope now we get to see them actually together a little bit more from now on.  I liked their phone conversations but I miss their face-to-face interactions.  Can't wait for more of their lovey-dovey scenes!