- As season five of TGS begins, Liz and Carol are forced to confront their relationship, Jack and Avery battle over home decorating, Jenna becomes a TGS producer, and Tracy struggles with life at 30 Rock without Kenneth.
- Determined to help Liz keep a man for once, Jack meddles in her burgeoning relationship with Carol. At home, he also struggles to compromise with Avery as she redecorates his apartment. Meanwhile, Tracy Jordan has trouble coming to grips with Kenneth's termination as a page and Jenna becomes TGS' newest producer.—NBC Publicity
- Open with Liz waking up to an end-of-summer call from Jack. He's had a fantastic month vacation with Avery. For the bearded Jack, Avery is the "most perfect woman ever created." After hanging up with Jack, Liz gets a call from Carol (Matt Damon), the pilot she is still seeing. He has a few more stops to make and then he will be meeting her in New York. After this she gets a call from Tracy, who says he will be "giving you 110 percent this year. I'm relaxed, I'm focused and I'll going to be turning out the good stuff like you've never seen." It turns out Tracy misdialed and thought he was speaking to his nutritionist.
Liz, Jack and Pete go over the contracts for this season. NBC is still the least profitable arm of Universal, and to help make the merger with Kabletown more appealing, they are trying to cut corners. They discover that a contract clause has kicked in for Jenna and she will now be getting a producer credit. Jenna walks in and can't wait to begin the producers' meeting.
Even though the page was fired last season, Tracy is seeing Kenneth's head on other people's bodies around the office.
Liz and Jack discuss relationships. Liz is happy with how things are going with Carol but Jack points out that since they are just rendezvousing in hotel rooms every few weeks (and not staying at Liz's place) they aren't engaged in an adult relationship. Jack is having an issue of his own with Avery, who wants to redecorate his apartment. Jack tells her his gameplan with women has always been The Fabian Strategy, which is basically to constantly retreat until the other party makes a mistake.
Jenna tells Pete she's discovered an employee who could be eliminated. Of course it ends up being an elderly wardrobe lady who's been there since the Jack Paar Show. Too scared to make a cut like that himself, Pete seems giddy.
Tracy hallucinates that Liz is Kenneth. She tells him the next time that happens, he should tell himself, "This is not real; I'm in control of this." "Like the World Cup," Tracy says. Kenneth is everywhere and Tracy needs to leave and clear his head.
Frank is doing "Would you rathers?" in the office. Carol shows up and tells her that the hotel chain where they always stay is shockingly booked up at every location in the city. It seems something called 'JackFest' has taken every room.
Liz confronts Jack who says his move was "for your own good." She doesn't like her "life stuff mixing with her dude stuff" and idolizes the lifestyle of "Barefoot Contessa" star Ina Garten who spends all day cooking and drinking with her gay friends and rarely sees her husband.
Kenneth is now a page for the Letterman show. Tracy walks by him but thinks he's hallucinating again.
Liz and Carol watch "Barefoot Contessa" (which he also loves) at her place. After talking about how perfect they are for each other, Carol begins to sob. All his life he's had casual relationships in different cities and he's now ready for something more grownup.
An angry Liz calls Jack to blame him for Carol's meltdown. Jack has successful retreated for another day. Avery had some paint samples and was fired up for awhile. Eventually she calmed down, they had sex and she is now asleep. To get back at him, Liz emails Avery a wallpaper site to her Blackberry.
The next day Pete tells Liz how happy he is about Jenna's promotion. Jenna is so busy he's been able to workout and have sex with his still-asleep wife.
Liz pops into Jack's office to ask about the wallpaper site. Though it did wake Avery up, the Fabian strategy worked again as she made the mistake of scheduling Jack to meet with a male interior designer. Since the man is almost certain to be gay -- his name is "James" rather than "Jim" or "Jimmy" -- Jack will be able to distract him with his good looks. Liz and Carol had an emotional breakfast and Jack tells her she needs to decide whether Carol is worth giving up her "precious autonomy."
Tracy sees Kenneth again and still thinks he is a figment of his imagination. To prove he is real, Kenneth hurls himself in front of cab. Tracy begs Kenneth to come back to TGS but he says he's happy at CBS.
Jack flirts shamelessly with James.
Jenna tells Pete she's discovered that she must fire herself. The show simply has too many producers and she is so good at it that she realizes her position must be terminated. Pete is despondent and offers to take a pay cut or fire Liz.
Frank offers Liz another "Would you rather": Be with the person you love but have to wear shirt made of their pubes, or live alone and wear what you want. Liz chooses the pube-shirt just as Carol walks up behind her and says the same thing. He wants the relationship with her and thinks they have to move forward a little with each visit. They agree to simultaneously say one personal fact the other doesn't know. Liz says she is on a wait-list to adopt a child and Carol says he was abused by a priest. They high-five and he leaves.
Before the first show of the season Jack congratulates Liz on growing up. He tells Liz that he and James have decided to knock down a wall in order to make a closet bigger and gain some "architectural symmetry." Liz points out that this was probably Avery's goal along and Jack is even more impressed she was able to trick him. They are perfect together, "like whisky and hunting." "She's your pube-shirt," Liz adds.
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