This is the episode where Ben, stuck in a week between jobs, invents an absurdly overbuilt board game called The Cones of Dunshire ahead of starting at an accounting firm, then quits that firm the same week when Leslie engineers his path to become Pawnee's city manager.
The A-plot is Leslie's crusade to lock the Pawnee Commons money in a lockbox ahead of her recall taking effect, which sends her to a weekend siege of Jamm's house complete with a \"Summer Nights\" karaoke duet, though her win is really a hidden attempt to give Ann a reason not to move.
Meanwhile Donna, newly licensed as Regal Meagle Realty, quietly sells Ron's cabin, and Ron picks April's sincere lowball offer over a developer's cash because she shares his refuge purpose.
Underneath the comedy, Ann signs the Ann Arbor lease that makes her departure real.
Set List
Interiors Pawnee City Hall council chambers and the city manager's office; Ben's home where he demos the Cones of Dunshire; Barney's accounting firm office with the family-trust case files and the break room; Jamm's house and its "weekend dojo" with the benihana-style hibachi table and exercise equipment; the karaoke bar; the office break room set for the calzone pizza party.
Exteriors Ron's remote forest cabin with its razor-sharp perimeter defense planks and berry patch, staged as an open house; the surrounding pines and "meta-cabin" middle-of-nowhere woods that the hipster buyers gawk at.
Placement
- Sits mid-season 6 as the pivot after the S06E07 recall loss, converting Leslie's defeat into forward motion and moving Ben into the city manager chair that reorients the back half of the season.
- Functions as a bridge into the Ann and Chris farewell run, planting the Ann Arbor lease here so E11 through E13 can close that relationship arc.
- Plants the Cones of Dunshire as a long-fuse series gag that detonates in S06E21 and echoes across later seasons, giving a bottle-style plot outsized franchise reach.
References
People
Michelle WiepersonJamm has a Photoshopped bikini picture of the golfer Michelle Wie on his wall and insists it is not sexual, he is just a big fan of her game.
Morgan FreemanpersonJamm says he has not seen Million Dollar Baby and is not a big Morgan Freeman guy because he finds Freeman's voice very grating.
Dave EggerspersonA prospective buyer at Ron's cabin claims Dave Eggers wrote a short story about a cassette tape found under a nearby tree, part of the ironic-hipster appeal Tom stokes.
Music
- NNeko CasemusicTom fuels buyer interest by claiming Neko Case and Ben Gibbard once made out at the cabin.
- BBen GibbardmusicNamed alongside Neko Case in Tom's invented story that the two musicians made out at Ron's cabin to raise its cool factor.
Games
- TThe Cones of DunshiregameBen's homemade board game with wizards, a Maverick, warriors, a corporal and a ledgerman, where players accumulate cones by building civilizations, and the tag ends with the accountants opening it as Ben's going-away gift.
Social media, apps, and websites named
- Jamm frames his rivalry with Leslie as Superman versus Lex Luthor, then happily takes the Lex Luthor role because Lex Luthor is rich.
- Jamm reads Leslie's emotional outburst as a play and says he digs her Gambit, referencing the X-Men card-throwing mutant, prompting Leslie to say there is no Gambit here.
Films, TV, and podcasts named
- GGreasefilmJamm takes karaoke to Rydell High, the film's high school, and he and Leslie sing the duet Summer Nights, with Leslie insisting she is Sandra Dee to his Danny Zuko.
Leslie later refuses to sing Beauty School Dropout, calling it sexist. - MMillion Dollar BabyfilmLeslie insults Jamm by saying he probably watches Million Dollar Baby and roots for the stool.
- TThe ApprenticetvJamm brags that he is about to play golf with a guy who was almost on The Apprentice, so the pitch had better be good.
- DDr. PhiltvBen offers to mediate Leslie's fight with Jamm like Dr. Phil, only qualified.
Brands, products, and places
- PPinterestproductBen tells his coworker Frank he loved the banana cake Frank's mom posted on Pinterest.
- DDKNYproductLeslie mentions she bought an irregular DKNY skirt with a crooked hem for eight dollars at the outlet mall on the way to Jamm's.
- BBenihanaplaceJamm boasts his teppanyaki-style table came from an actual Benihana and cost him four grand.
- UUniversity of MichiganplaceChris announces he has a new job lined up at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, and he cheers Go Blue.
- PPinterest banana cake, Ann Arbor and PawneeplaceLeslie disparages Ann Arbor as disgusting because it has no JJ's Diner and no Welcome to Pawnee sign, and mocks Michigan for being split into two pieces.
- GGlampingproductA developer wants to tear down Ron's cabin for a luxury glamp-ground, defined in the episode as glamour camping with heated tents, catered meals and wi-fi, which Ron notes is just a hotel.
Callbacks
- Pawnee Commons is Leslie's sacred civic dream, tracked from prior seasons. The lockbox fight in this episode inherits the whole arc, she calls it "the greatest future park in the world, aka my personal dream project," and even ties it to how she first met Ann five years earlier.
- The recall loss from S06E07 sets the entire board. Jamm needles Leslie that "the voters gave you the stanky boot," and Ron notes she has 30 days left, so every lockbox maneuver runs against her ticking clock as a lame-duck councilor.
- Ben's between-jobs pattern is an established running gag. Leslie references his last unemployment spiral, "the last time he was in between jobs, he got deep into claymation, so this should be different," framing the Cones of Dunshire build as the next entry in a known behavior.
- The Leslie-versus-Jamm rivalry is scored across the whole series. Leslie states they have gone head-to-head 112 times, 56 wins each, so the lockbox becomes an explicit tiebreaker in a long-running institutional feud with her recurring council antagonist.
- Ron's woodworking-as-love-language runs straight from S06E08. The cabin he sells is his quiet refuge, and he only agrees to sell to someone who shares that purpose, which is why he accepts April's sincere "look at spiders" offer over a rich developer's cash.
- The Ann and Chris departure arc closes in on its farewell. Ann's Ann Arbor lease signing here is the concrete step that makes the S06E13 goodbye inevitable, and Leslie's whole lockbox scramble is secretly an attempt to give Ann a reason to stay.
Tropes used
- Unemployed Nerd Invents Massively Complex Game as Coping Mechanism. Ben fills his week-long job gap by building The Cones of Dunshire, a game with two wizards, a Maverick, an arbiter, warriors, a corporal, a ledgerman in a special hat, cones, civilizations, roadblocks, trivia cards, and challenge play that is "basically the game in reverse."
- Leslie Knope's Pawnee Commons as Sacred Civic Object. She treats the discretionary fund like a relic to be enshrined in a lockbox, ready to spend a full weekend at Jamm's house and trade away her own ethics rather than let the money slip from the park.
- Donna's social maneuvering operating below the radar. As Regal Meagle Realty, Donna runs the cabin sale, splits commission with Tom, works both the buyers and Ron's terms, and quietly steers the whole transaction to a clean close.
- Ben and Leslie's karaoke detente with an antagonist. To move negotiations along, Leslie performs "Summer Nights" as Sandra Dee with Jamm as Zuko, using shared entertainment as a bargaining chip against a political enemy.
- Ron Swanson's refuge principle as a values gate. Ron rejects the highest bid because the developer wants to tear the cabin down for a glamp-ground, insisting the next owner must "understand and share that purpose" of a quiet escape from modern life.
Tropes subverted
- The quirky coping mechanism becomes a genuine phenomenon. The Cones of Dunshire is played as a symptom of Ben's unemployment spiral in this episode, yet it later turns into a professionally produced hit that the Gryzzl entrepreneurs play in S06E21, reframing the sad-nerd hobby as visionary product.
- Political conflict gets resolved by karaoke instead of procedure. Jamm gets worn down by a night of scrambled eggs with chopsticks, fake sushi, and a duet, collapsing a governance fight into a party.
- Leslie wins the battle and it plays as a loss. She technically beats Jamm in their "final battle," but the victory unravels the moment Ben states the real stakes.
This was never about the park, it was a doomed bid to keep Ann in Pawnee. - The clean civic win is actually an unethical backroom deal. Leslie gets her lockbox only after Ben trades Jamm five worthless IOUs, knowing he is leaving city government, so the triumphant park groundbreaking is secured by a bluff Leslie admits is "not the most ethical thing that I've ever done."
Threads planted, where they pay off
- Ben becomes Pawnee city manager , the appointment that resets his career for the rest of the season after the accounting-firm detour, and it lets him quit Barney's firm on his first real day.
- The Pawnee Commons lockbox is secured , setting up the midnight groundbreaking Leslie stages as Ann and Chris's farewell gift in S06E13.
- The Cones of Dunshire goes viral , resurfacing in S06E21 when the Gryzzl team is found playing a professional edition, which feeds the larger Gryzzl storyline.
- Ann's Ann Arbor lease is signed , locking in the Ann and Chris departure that pays off in their S06E13 goodbye episode.
Production file
- Written by Dave King, directed by Julie Anne Robinson, aired November 21, 2013 to 2.81 million viewers.
- The episode was written by Dave King and directed by Julie Anne Robinson, and it aired on NBC on November 21, 2013.
- It drew about 2.81 million US viewers on first broadcast.
- The episode introduces The Cones of Dunshire, the absurdly overcomplicated board game Ben Wyatt invents during a week off between jobs, which became one of the show's most beloved running gags.
- Dave King, a co-producer on the series, has said the game was deliberately written with rules that are nearly impossible to build into a real playable game, existing mainly so Adam Scott's Ben could reference it.
- Jon Glaser guest stars as Councilman Jeremy Jamm, Leslie's nemesis, whom she battles over the Pawnee Commons lockbox.
- The episode marks Ann Perkins and Chris Traeger's move to Ann Arbor, Michigan, part of writing out Rashida Jones and Rob Lowe mid-season.
- Ben references golfing with a guy who was almost on The Apprentice, and the episode ends with Ben leaving his accounting job to become Pawnee's next city manager.
Scene by scene
Scene 1
The Cones of Dunshire
Ben and Leslie's home, living roomScene Summary
- Ben unveils an absurdly elaborate board game he invented during his week off between jobs.
- The game, The Cones of Dunshire, features wizards, a Maverick, an arbiter, warriors, a corporal, and a hat-wearing ledgerman.
- Leslie tries to be supportive while growing alarmed at how deep Ben has gone.
- Ben admits he starts a new accounting job the next day, then keeps refining the rules anyway.
Recap Girl play-by-play
- Leslie asks if Ben is ready, and he confesses he got fired from the Sweetums Foundation ahead of pivoting to an accounting job that courted him three times.
- Ben presents The Cones of Dunshire and lists its many roles, dwelling on the ledgerman who just keeps score and wears a hat.
- He explains the object is to accumulate four cones, but first you have to build a civilization.
- Ben rolls three dice to determine how many dice he rolls with, gets 16, and calls it perfect.
- Leslie keeps asking what the game is called and whether the cones are a metaphor, and Ben answers yes and no.
- Ben suddenly realizes the Maverick should trade lumber for agriculture credits, and Leslie says she will just throw the whole thing in the garbage as he heads back to work tomorrow.
Color Host notes
- The cold open plants the season's runner: Ben's chronic over-engineering when idle, a trait the writers weaponize for the finale payoff.
- The ledgerman-with-a-hat detail is classic Parks specificity, a throwaway that becomes the tag button.
- Leslie's genuine worry undercuts the comedy, keeping Ben sympathetic rather than merely ridiculous.
- The game becomes a metaphor for Ben's need for structure and control, mirroring Leslie's own lockbox obsession later in the episode.
Scene 2
The Stanky Boot
Pawnee City Council chambersScene Summary
- Leslie, recently voted out, tries to protect Pawnee Commons funding ahead of leaving office.
- She proposes moving the discretionary money into a lockbox so it can only be used for the park.
- Councilman Jamm blocks her and gloats that the decision is no longer hers.
- The council tables the discussion until the second Leslie is gone.
Recap Girl play-by-play
- Jamm heckles Leslie during roll call, mocking her with a bricks joke as she opens new business.
- Leslie pitches moving Pawnee Commons money, her personal dream project, into a lockbox to lock it in.
- A councilmember reminds Leslie the decision is not up to her because the voters gave her the stanky boot.
- Jamm needles her and calls her baby girl, promising to keep her money safe.
- Leslie accuses him of wanting a limestone shower in his office, and he cheerfully agrees that is now his plan.
- Jamm moves to table the discussion until Leslie is gone and exits calling everyone bunheads.
Color Host notes
- Establishes the A-plot stakes: Leslie's lame-duck status makes every remaining battle feel like a last stand.
- Jamm is the perfect low-status antagonist, petty enough that beating him feels both trivial and irresistible.
- The stanky boot line is a writers' trick, using cartoonish slang to soften the real sting of Leslie losing her seat.
- Leslie's dream-project framing quietly seeds the emotional truth revealed later, that the park is really about Ann.
Scene 3
Regal Meagle Realty
City Hall hallway and officesScene Summary
- Ron announces he wants to sell one of his cabins and needs help staging it.
- Donna reveals she just earned her real estate license and offers to list it.
- Tom angles his way into the deal for a cut of the commission.
- Leslie recruits Ben to help her fight Jamm, and he agrees to support from the sidelines.
Recap Girl play-by-play
- Ron approaches Donna wanting to sell his cabin, and his draft listing warns buyers he will not clean up shotgun shells or animal carcasses.
- Donna flashes her new Regal Meagle Realty card with the slogan Find your castle and takes the listing.
- Tom asks Donna to let him split the commission, and she tells him to show her what he has.
- Tom monologues about which kind of mogul he should be, landing on real estate mogul as the hot pick.
- Leslie tells Ben that Jamm is a dinkhead and reveals her lifetime score against Jamm is tied 56 to 56.
- Leslie begs Ben for help, and he declines to help directly but promises to assist and mediate like a qualified Dr. Phil.
Color Host notes
- Launches the B-plot with a clean engine: Ron selling means Ron must let strangers judge his private world.
- Tom's mogul riff is a character-defining aria, ambition with no fixed object beyond the word itself.
- The 56-to-56 score reframes Leslie's fight as a personal rivalry rather than pure policy, raising the comedic stakes.
- Ben's I cannot help directly but I am on your side line sets up his role as the episode's conscience and eventual dealmaker.
Scene 4
Ben Reports for Duty
Accounting firm, Ben's new officeScene Summary
- Ben starts his new accounting job and meets his supervisor Barney and colleague Frank.
- Frank explains he took the job Ben passed up last time and challenges Ben to live up to the hype.
- Ben finishes a quick call with a pregnant Ann in a deliberately calming voice.
- He is handed the firm's toughest case on his very first Friday.
Recap Girl play-by-play
- Ben arrives eager and greets Barney, saying he cannot believe it is finally happening.
- Frank introduces himself, notes he took the job Ben passed up, and warns he is not joking about the hype.
- Ben wraps a phone call, telling Ann to say hi to Michigan and complimenting her mom's Pinterest banana cake.
- A coworker asks if that was Ann, and Ben speaks lovingly to the unborn baby who can supposedly hear everything.
- Barney apologizes for starting Ben on a hard case on a Friday, describing three competing family trusts and a contested will.
- Ben quips that if he is murdered tonight, the investigation should start with the two skeptical coworkers eyeing him.
Color Host notes
- The accounting plot gives Ben a low-stakes arena to be quietly brilliant, contrasting his showy Cones of Dunshire energy.
- Frank's live up to the hype needling is a sitcom shorthand for workplace hazing that pays off when Ben cracks the case.
- The Ann phone call keeps the Ann-leaving thread alive across plots without a scene of Ann herself.
- Ben's murder-investigation joke signals his outsider status and sets up how satisfying his eventual acceptance will be.
Scene 5
No Shoes, You Lose
Jamm's house and weekend dojoScene Summary
- Leslie and Ben ambush Jamm at home to keep negotiating the lockbox.
- Jamm lets them in under his house-of-respect rules and reveals his sad divorced-guy lifestyle.
- Leslie declares she is not leaving until she gets the lockbox and settles in overnight.
- The next morning Jamm serves a bizarre Japanese-themed breakfast and finally agrees to talk.
Recap Girl play-by-play
- Leslie and Ben show up at Jamm's door, and Leslie insists they are not done talking about the lockbox.
- Jamm respects the moxie and lets them in, demanding shoes off and coining No shoes, you lose.
- Jamm gives a tour of his weekend dojo, mentions his wife is in Oklahoma maybe forever, and shows a self-Photoshopped Michelle Wie bikini picture.
- Leslie announces she is playing hardball and brought a sleeping bag, caramel corn, and a crooked eight-dollar DKNY skirt from the outlet mall.
- The next morning Jamm offers an authentic Japanese breakfast of scrambled eggs eaten with chopsticks at his four-thousand-dollar Benihana table.
- Leslie sweetens the mood by offering brewskis and a female-wrestler calendar, and Jamm finally agrees to talk.
Color Host notes
- The overnight siege escalates Leslie's obsession into physical comedy, committing fully to a fight over petty stakes.
- Jamm's dojo and abandoned-husband details humanize him just enough to make his pettiness pathetic rather than villainous.
- The cultural-appropriation breakfast gags run right up to the line, played as Jamm's cluelessness rather than the show's endorsement.
- Leslie learning to bribe Jamm with wrestlers and beer shows her tactical willingness to debase herself for the park.
Scene 6
The Meta-Cabin Open House
Ron's remote forest cabinScene Summary
- Tom and Donna stage Ron's cabin and host an open house against Ron's wishes.
- Ron prefers to sit outside doing nothing while they decorate the place with kitsch.
- Ironic hipster buyers mock the cabin's remoteness as charmingly meta.
- Tom feeds the buyers fake literary and music trivia to drive up interest.
Recap Girl play-by-play
- Tom plans fake antlers with crocheted scarves and antique Visit France posters, and Donna approves as most def.
- Ron chooses to stay outside and watch the shadows get longer rather than watch his cabin become garbage.
- Tom lights an evergreen candle, and buyers call the cabin random and a meta-cabin because it is so far away.
- Tom invents a story that Dave Eggers wrote a short story about a tape cassette found under a nearby tree.
- Ron asks what Tom is doing, and Tom says he is getting the annoying dumdums to pay more, so Ron tells him to carry on.
- Tom escalates with a claim that Neko Case and Ben Gibbard once made out at the cabin.
Color Host notes
- The open house satirizes hipster irony, where remoteness and ugliness become selling points if framed as authentic.
- Ron doing nothing outside is a purity-of-character beat, his stillness contrasted against Tom's frantic salesmanship.
- Tom's fabricated indie-lit and indie-rock references are precise cultural jokes aimed squarely at the ironic buyers.
- Ron's mounting discomfort seeds his later decision to reject the highest bidder in favor of the right owner.
Scene 7
Ben Cracks the Case
Accounting firm, Saturday and beyondScene Summary
- Ben quietly solves the firm's impossible case by proposing they dissolve the trust.
- His skeptical coworkers stage the reveal so Ben looks like a lightbulb-moment genius.
- Back at Jamm's, negotiations drag through fake edamame and karaoke.
- Leslie sings Sandra Dee to Jamm's Zuko to win his cooperation.
Recap Girl play-by-play
- On Saturday Ben works the case, reasoning through dissolving the loan-out, filing bankruptcy, and finally dissolving the trust.
- The coworkers realize Ben is right, then ask him to repeat the idea while they dramatically turn on a light for effect.
- Ben restates the plan, they cheer that he cracked the case, and he modestly says he is just doing his job.
- At Jamm's, Leslie shoots down a No Married Chicks zone, and Jamm serves edamame he calls Tokyo beans with reversed eating instructions.
- Jamm insists on a change of venue to karaoke, remembering Leslie's favorite duet from Grease.
- Leslie performs Summer Nights as Sandra Dee to Jamm's Zuko while Jamm racks up bidders in the cabin plot and vows to buy DVDs of the karaoke.
Color Host notes
- Ben's competence is the plot's quiet engine, rewarding the audience for rooting against his hazers.
- The turn-the-light-on-again gag is a sharp joke about how credit is theatrically manufactured in offices.
- The cross-cutting between Ben's win and Leslie's karaoke humiliation contrasts two ways of earning a yes.
- Leslie choosing the woman's part and correcting Jamm's karaoke tally shows her competitiveness leaking into every interaction.
Scene 8
This Is About Ann
Jamm's house, after karaokeScene Summary
- Jamm finally offers a written one-year lockbox deal, but Leslie rejects it and snaps.
- Ben deduces the real reason Leslie cannot wait: it is about Ann leaving.
- Leslie confesses she hoped breaking ground would give Ann a reason to stay.
- Ben gently reveals Ann has already signed the lease on their new Michigan home.
Recap Girl play-by-play
- Jamm agrees to a lockbox with a one-year construction delay and a binding, error-riddled written note, framing it as a karaoke triple dragon.
- Leslie refuses, insisting construction start Monday, and lashes out that Jamm cannot even make sushi from tuna salad.
- Jamm hands Leslie a card, and Ben asks everyone to excuse them as Leslie melts down.
- Ben realizes the urgency is about Ann and that breaking ground was Leslie's bid to make Ann want to stay.
- Ben tells Leslie that Ann did not just visit Michigan, she went to sign the lease on their new home.
- Leslie unravels, insulting Ann Arbor, Michigan's two-piece shape, and even Morgan Freeman, then declares she is going home.
Color Host notes
- This is the emotional pivot where a petty turf war is revealed as displaced grief over losing a best friend.
- The reveal recontextualizes the entire A-plot, a signature Parks move of hiding heart under comedy.
- Jamm's obliviousness during Leslie's breakdown keeps the scene from turning maudlin, his Gambit and Superman jokes cutting the tension.
- Leslie attacking Michigan and Morgan Freeman shows displacement, aiming her heartbreak at absurd targets she can safely hate.
Scene 9
The Right Kind of Legacy
Accounting firm, cabin, and City HallScene Summary
- Ben's coworkers throw him a calzone party for cracking the case, cementing his belonging.
- Ron rejects the highest bid and sells the cabin cheaply to Leslie, who values its purpose.
- Ben secretly makes a deal with Jamm, trading worthless future IOUs for Leslie's lockbox.
- Ben reveals Leslie can become the next city manager, and he quits accounting to make room.
Recap Girl play-by-play
- Ben's coworkers surprise him with a party, revealing the pizza is actually calzones, and Ben feels he made the right choice.
- Ron turns down a massive over-asking bid because he wants a buyer who shares the cabin's purpose as a refuge, and Leslie buys it for eight dollars, cough drops, and Larry's inhaler.
- Ben meets Jamm on the golf course and offers five huge no-questions-asked IOUs from his next term as city manager in exchange for the lockbox.
- Jamm takes the deal, the council vote passes three to two, and Ben admits the IOUs will be worthless once he and Leslie leave.
- Ben tells Leslie the town needs a new city manager and she already has the votes, and she says she would be insane to say no.
- Ben quits the accounting job on day one, leaving The Cones of Dunshire in the break room as a going-away gift, and the coworkers eagerly start a game with Frank calling ledgerman.
Color Host notes
- The finale braids all three plots into one theme of choosing the right legacy over the biggest payoff.
- Ron selling low to the right buyer and Ben trading worthless IOUs both reward principle and love over money.
- The city-manager reveal is the season's real engine turning over, a career door opening the moment Leslie's council seat closes.
- The Cones of Dunshire returning as the tag pays off the cold open, immortalizing Ben's obsessive creation as the office's new ritual.
Verbatim lines
Presenting The Cones of Dunshire, a brand-new gaming experience. Two wizards, a Maverick, the arbiter, two warriors, a corporal, and a ledgerman.
The last time he was in between jobs, he got deep into claymation, so this should be different, hopefully.
Current owner will not clean up shotgun shells or animal carcasses.
You're the Superman to my Lex Luthor. You want to be Lex Luthor? Lex Luthor is rich. Well, okay. I can't argue with that.
You probably watch Million Dollar Baby and root for the stool.
I call ledgerman!
GreaseMillion Dollar BabyThe ApprenticeDr. Phil
Sources: Parks Wiki · transcript saved locally (tv-scripts corpus) · trope/callback data from the Parks trope index