Charlie comes up to Sam in his office and asks whether he knows of a guy named Farley who used to work for the President. Sam does not, and asks the fellow's first name. Charlie doesn't know; he's got a letter to POTUS from a kid saying that when he was Governor and campaigning, the kid met Bartlet's assistant, Mr. Farley. Sam thinks it must be someone who was involved before his own time. But Charlie says it can't be that early on, because the kid says they met when his father took him to a budget speech in Pittsburgh. Sam corrects him, saying it was San Diego, and that they never did a budget speech in Pittsburgh. Charlie thinks this is weird. Sam: "How many weird letters does the President get a day?" Charlie: "Couple of thousand. But this one has the President's private mail code on it, that's why I got it." Sam: "Well, how many confused people does the President befriend every day?" Charlie says it's a couple of dozen, but he doesn't give them the private mail code. POTUS has time to befriend a couple of dozen confused people a day? Cripes. I can barely deal with one or two confused people a day, and god knows even just my email brings me more than that. Moreover, I don't feel compelled to befriend most of them. Well, I guess with a staff of thousands, you have time for those things. Sam shrugs as they reach the Roosevelt Room and says he's on with the Russians. Charlie vamooses.

Sam enters and introduces himself to two ambassadors, who introduce themselves as Nikolai Ivanovich and George Kowzlowski. Sam says this should be quick, as he sits down and adds that Bartlet is jazzed about meeting Chigorin. Well, he doesn't say "jazzed." (A brief note: since English is not the first language of these ambassadors, it's understandably less than perfect. By and large, it's probably better than your Russian or mine. Anyway, I'm going to render their words as spoken, with its slightly incorrect syntax and missing articles and so forth. Please don't read the recap and then go rushing off to the Editorial Issues thread to report a bunch of non-errors. If you haven't compared my transcript to an actual tape of the episode, please, go outside and get some fresh air or something.)