what was the thing on the carpet in the office
The Carpet The exact nature of the substance that is deposited on Michael's carpet is never explicitly made clear. Fischer only described it as "soft [...] smelly [and] brown".[6] In fact, the circumstance in which the substance is viewed by the camera is still ambiguous; Television Without Pity reviewer M. Giant noted that the viewer only gets "the merest out-of-focus Blair Witch glimpse" of the substance.[7] Fischer also noted that one of the more interesting aspects of the episode was the "you [the audience] finally see Pam and Roy getting along."[6] She explained that this was because Roy and Pam returned from "a romantic vacation in the Poconos."[6]