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Michael feigns walking descending a staircase behind a stack of paper boxes under the guise of retrieving a pencil "from the warehouse" for a reluctant Ryan. An overzealous Dwight prompts a second go-around of the joke, and Pam keeps the joke alive, pleading for a cup of coffee, which Michael crawls to the breakroom to retrieve. In an interview, he likens himself to Bette Midler in For the Boys: "Gotta keep the troops entertained." Upon his return crawl, Pam requests cream and sugar in her coffee.

Michael flips through his Rolodex and starts to flirt with Jan on the phone after she tells him "We've lost Ed Truck." He is shaken to learn Jan hasn't lost a contact number, but that the former Scranton branch manager has died. Kelly and Phyllis console Michael after he breaks the news to a mostly unmoved staff. He announces he'll be in his office for consolation pop-ins, but with no takers he wanders to the reception desk and engulfs Pam in an awkward too-long hug, telling her Truck was "almost 70, so ... circle of life."

Meanwhile at a staff meeting in Stamford, Karen irritates Josh when she neglects to compile a supply list for Fairfield County Schools. She is angered when Josh asks Jim to ensure she completes the task. Jim agrees and Andy calls him a suck-up in a barely disguised cough. In the Stamford breakroom, Karen is dismayed to learn the vending machine is out of salt and vinegar Herr's potato chips, and turns her meeting room ire on a friendly Jim, telling him her snack food needs do not fall under his authority. He counters that he does have that power, and no work shall be completed until the chips she requires are procured.

Michael makes a comment on Creed's age, but the mood changes when Creed mentions Truck was decapitated after flying down Route 6, drunk as a skunk and sliding his vehicle beneath an 18-wheeler. Dwight steals Michael's thunder with a blunt announcement of the latest news. Dwight receives only disgust from his "Monkey" when he asks her to pack his decapitated head on ice should that fate ever befall him. In an interview, Dwight explains he would like to be frozen, even in pieces, so that he may one day be reanimated with the knowledge to avoid the same death in the future.

On speakerphone with Jan, Michael laments the staff receives a whole day off in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr., "and he didn't even work here." On his desk is a decade-old Dunder-Mifflin newsletter with a full-color photo of Truck and a mulleted Michael above a headline reading "Michael Scott achieves top sales honors for Third straight quarter." In lieu of a day off, Michael suggests a full-size statue of Truck with illuminated eyes and mobile arms. Jan finds the idea unrealistic and hangs up, but an ever-resourceful Dwight prepares a schematic of a 2/3 size Truck robot with a six-foot extension cord in case it were to turn against the staff.

Back in Stamford, Jim phones potential chip sources as Karen prepares to give up the search. Gentle taunting lures her back in as she assures him "I am not a quitter." The pair mock Andy when he tries to horn in on their activity via inane suggestion.

Michael disgusts some employees by imagining the bloodbath Truck endured when his "cappa was de-tated ... from his head." He summons the staff to a primitive grief counseling session involving a collapsible ball. Expounding on his feeling at the loss of his beloved ex-boss, he says it "feels like my heart has been dropped into a bucket of boiling tears and someone else is hitting my soul in the crotch with a frozen sledgehammer and a third guy is punching me in the griefbone, but no one hears me because I'm terribly, terribly alone."

Roy pulls Pam from the session under the guise of a radiator issue in her new Toyota Yaris hatchback. In the parking lot, Pam and Roy have a banal chat about her car's airbags and he asks if she's "still driving too fast." Upon her return to the grief session, she finds Michael had put the whole thing on hold because "we wait for a family member." Stanley refuses to play Michael's grief game but Dwight gladly tells the group he resorbed another fetus while still in the womb, making him as strong as a man combined with a baby. Pam expounds on the death of her aunt that mirrors the plot of Million Dollar Baby and Ryan tells the tale of his cousin Mufasa who was trampled by wildebeests, horrifying those "in the audience ... of what happened." His story echoes The Lion King, and he says it would take over an hour and a half to tell the whole story(the actual film is eighty-eight minutes in length). Eager to play along, Kevin poorly disguises Weekend at Bernie's as his tale of grief, angering Michael as he catches on to what is going on.

Toby tells Michael death is a part of life, and uses an example of a bird that flew into a Dunder-Mifflin first-floor window that morning. Mortified that Toby did not investigate the bird's health, Michael charges outside, picks up the deceased animal and attempts to resuscitate it via mouth-to-mouth, rebuking Dwight's pleas to drop the germ-ridden being.

When attempts to revive the bird fail, Michael schedules a 4 p.m. parking lot funeral for the bird and putting the kibosh on office productivity for the day, despite staff telling him that they all still have a lot of work to complete. Dwight breaks off the bird's beak in an attempt to stuff it through the pop-tab of an empty soda can. In an interview he comments on the resourcefulness of farm-dwellers such as himself and reveals his grandfather was reburied in an oil drum.

Pam fashions a makeshift coffin and reads a prepared speech that comforts Michael. She mentions that also the bird was an unknown among the staff, he surely did not die alone as it had the company of other birds, and likely wanted in Dunder-Mifflin Scranton in order to serenade the staff with a song. Michael is noticeably moved from the speech as his eyes well with tears. Dwight interrupts her to state that the deceased was "not a songbird." Pam accompanies Dwight who plays "On the Wings of Love" on his recorder. The coffin is placed in a box of shredded paper and set afire.

Karen finds a bag of Herr's on her desk and, in a voiceover, Jim says he traced the chips from the manufacturer to the distributor to the vending machine company to an adjacent office building.

Dwight extinguishes and stomps out the funeral pyre and coffin before ordering warehouse employees to "get a broom, mush."

• This episode was originally scheduled to air after "Initiation".
• It is revealed that Michael, Phyllis, and Creed have worked in the office the longest.
• Jokingly in his family member death story, Kevin says the plot of Weekend at Bernie's. In a deleted scene for The Fire, he states that as one of his top five favorite movies.

Pam: The warehouse coffee tastes so much better.

Michael: I’m like Bette Midler in “For the Boys.” Gotta keep the troops entertained.

Michael: Attention everybody! I just received a call from Corporate with some news that they felt that I should know first.

Michael: Well I’ll be in my office, in case anybody wants to drop by. To cheer me up.

Michael: So’d you hear the news?
Pam: The news that you just announced? That Ed died?

Michael: He was almost seventy. Circle of life.
Pam: Yeah.

Andy (coughing): Suck up! Josh, did you hear what I said?

Karen: Damn it.
Jim: What’s up?
Karen: Oh nothing. I’m just out of Herr’s Chips.
Jim: Oh.
Karen: But don’t worry about it. My snack food doesn’t fall under the umbrella of your authority.
Jim: Mmm, that’s where you’re wrong. I’m your project supervisor today, and I’ve just decided that we’re not doing anything, until you get the chips that you require. So I think we should go get some. Now, please.

Creed: It’s a real shame about Ed, huh?
Michael: Yeah. Must really have you thinking.
Creed: About what?
Michael: The older you get, the bigger the chances you’re going to die. You knew that.
Creed: Ed was decapitated.
Michael: What?
Dwight: Really?
Creed: He was drunk as a skunk, he was flying down Route 6, he slides under an 18-wheeler, pop, it snaps right off.
Michael: Oh my god.
Dwight: That is the way to go. Instant death. Very smart.
Creed: You know a human can go on living for several hours after being decapitated.
Dwight: You’re thinking of a chicken.
Creed: What did I say?

Michael: That is just not the way a Dunder Mifflin manager should go, I’m sorry. Alone, out of the blue. And not even have his own head to comfort him.

Dwight: Hey.
Angela: Hi …
Dwight: If my head ever comes off, I would like you to put it on ice.
Angela: I do not want to talk about this.

Dwight: When I die, I want to be frozen. And if they have to freeze me in pieces, so be it. I will wake up stronger than ever, because I will have used that time to figure out exactly why I died, and what moves I could have used to defend myself better now that I know what hold he had me in.

Michael: I don’t understand. We have a day honoring Martin Luther King, but he didn’t even work here.
Jan: I understand how you feel, Michael, I really do. So would it be helpful to give everyone the day off?
Michael: You really don’t get it, do you. You don’t understand these people. That is the last thing that they would want, is a day off.
Jan: Well, what would you suggest.
Michael: A statue.
Jan: Of Ed?
Michael: Yeah.
Jan: I’m not sure that’s realistic.
Michael: Well, I think it would be very realistic. It would look just like him.
Jan: No, that’s not …
Michael: We could have his eyes light up, we could have his arms move …
Dwight: That is not a statue, that is a robot.
Michael: I think that is a great way to honor Ed.
Dwight: And how big do you want this robot?
Michael: Life size.
Dwight: Mmm, no. Better make it two-thirds. Easier to stop it if it turns on us.
Jan: What the hell are you two talking about?

Dwight: Look, I gave him a six-foot extension cord so he can’t chase us.
Michael: That’s perfect.

Jim: Wow. Never pegged you for a quitter.
Karen: I am not a quitter. I will do this all day if you want.

Andy: Did you check the vending machine?
Karen: Oh the vending machines, how did we miss that?

Michael: WHAM! His capa is detated from his head!
Stanley: You have just spit on my face.

Michael: There are five stages to grief, which are denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. And right now, out there, they’re all denying the fact that they’re sad. And that’s … hard. And it’s making them all angry. And it is my job to try to get them all the way through to acceptance. And if not acceptance, then just depression. If I can get them depressed, then I’ll have done my job.

Michael: I lost Ed Truck. And it feels like somebody took my heart, and dropped it into a bucket of boiling tears. And, at the same time, somebody else is hitting my soul in the crotch with a frozen sledgehammer. And then, a third guy walks in and starts punching me in the grief bone. And I’m crying, and nobody can hear me. Because I am terribly, terribly, terribly alone.

Dwight: When my mother was pregnant with me, they did an ultrasound and found she was having twins. When they did another ultrasound a few weeks later, they discovered that I had resorbed the other fetus. Do I regret this? No. I believe his tissues made me stronger. I now have the strength of a grown man and a little baby.

Ryan: A few years ago, my family was on a safari in Africa, and my cousin, Mufasa, was um, he was trampled to death by a pack of wildebeests, and um, we all took it really hard. All of us, kind of in the audience, of what happened.
Michael: Do you want to talk about it anymore?
Ryan: Oh, it would probably take me like an hour and a half to tell that whole story.

Dwight: Michael, get him away from your head! He’s covered in germs and bacteria!
Michael: You can’t get diseases from a bird!

Michael: That is what you do when things die. You honor them. Toby killed this bird. And now we’re going to honor it.

Kelly (crying): I mean, how many times do I have to confirm plans with Ryan, for him to know we have a date tonight?

Dwight: I’m sorry. I grew up on a farm. We slaughtered a pig whenever we wanted bacon. My grandfather was re-buried in an old oil drum. It would have fit if he had given me another minute.

Pam: Did I wake up this morning thinking I’d be throwing together a bird funeral? You never can tell what your day here is going to turn into.

Ryan: When I was five, my mom told me that my fish went to the hospital. In the toilet. And it never came back, so we had a funeral for it. And I remember thinking, I’m a little too old for this. And I was five.

Pam: What do we know about this bird. You might think, not much, it’s just a bird. But we do know some things. We know it was a local bird. Maybe it’s that same bird that surprised Oscar that one morning with a special present from above.
Kevin: I remember that, that was so funny.
Pam: And we know how he died. Flying into the glass doors. But you know what, I don’t think he was being stupid. I think he just really, really wanted to come inside our building. To spread his cheer, and lift our spirits with a song.
Dwight: It’s not a songbird.
Michael: Sshhhh.
Pam: An impression, then. Lastly, we can’t help but notice that he was by himself when he died. But of course, we all know that doesn’t mean he was alone. Because I’m sure that there were lots of other birds out there who cared for him very much. He will not be forgotten.
Angela: Amen.

Michael: Society teaches us that having feelings and crying is bad and wrong. Well, that’s baloney. Because grief isn’t wrong. There’s such a thing as good grief. Just ask Charlie Brown.