If I had it my way, every single episode of Parks and Recreation would be wonderful, and we could spend Friday mornings going over funny lines and cracking up at all of the crazy shenanigans witnessed in Pawnee -- that's what happens most of the time, and what I expected to happen with the return of Louis C.K. as Officer Dave. Like most people who go on the Internet, I love basically everything about C.K. (and can vouch that Live at the Beacon Theater is well-worth the $5), but Dave just didn't do it for me, nor did "Dave Returns" as an episode.

If I ever get into the acting biz, Parks and Recreation is the first show I'm auditioning for (is this even how people get acting gigs?) because once you're in the Pawnee universe, you're there forever. That crazy DJ that Tom hired to announce his entrances into new places? In "Operation Ann," he's being considered in the search for the person responsible for getting the Valentine's Day dance attendees "wet with sound." That weird friend of April's who always freaks Ben out? He just may be an eligible suitor for Ann! It doesn't hurt that my memory for extremely minor characters is freakishly good, but I love every appearance we've ever gotten of both DJ Bluntz and Oren... but even then, as soon as you hear their name and see their mannerisms, they are instantly recognizable as the hilarious archetypes they're meant to be. Same goes with all of Pawnee's fine business establishments.

When Parks and Recreation first debuted, I remember the attitude surrounding it was that the series what basically The Office with Amy Poehler... especially considering it was originally conceived as a spin-off. The similarities were there, and The Office was still good enough at that point that a new show with a cast of mostly-unfamiliar faces seemed pretty much vestigial.

While I've definitely lowered the bar for some comedies, my expectations for Parks and Recreation are about is high as I go for a show that's in that genre. "Campaign Ad" would have been a fine episode of another series, but here it felt repetitive and all too familiar. I'm totally with Donna -- love the new haircut, by the way -- on not complaining about Paul Rudd's good looks (seriously, whatever lacked in comedy last night was overshadowed by eye candy), but otherwise, we've seen these plotlines before on this show and they've been done much better already. As much as I'd just love to gush about how funny and silly everyone was and give them grades, pointing out the repeats seems way more relevant. Nobody make a mean political video about me, okay?

And we're back. "The Comeback Kid" returned us to Leslie's city council campaign, Ben's unemployment and... that's pretty much it. I look forward to the minor characters' storylines for the rest of the season -- mostly Tom, because things have been quiet on the Haverford front since the collapse of E720 -- but for now, I'm fine just catching up with Knope 2012. Before we jump in and grade everyone, I should make the disclaimer that these letters are assigned sans the ice-walking scene, because otherwise everyone would have an A+. And as for harsh criticism of the episode, all I'm saying is, I sincerely hope there's more Donna next episode. She was also missing from the fabulous Parks & Rec short shown at the People's Choice Awards!

Now that Leslie and Ben are finally together forever, Parks and Recreation faces the challenge of giving us satisfying struggles for our power duo, and I think that "Citizen Knope" is so far covering that ground well. In last night's episode, we got to see Sad Ben make sense of his career plans and Leslie lose her campaign managers -- and while both plots where kind of predictable in their outings, their conclusions were unexpected yet sweet, while still managing to be believable and zany.

"The Trial of Leslie Knope" had all the makings of a great Parks and Recreation episode, especially if you've been watching the series since the very beginning of Lesliben's romance (also, credit to commenter J for creating that nickname). I appreciated that it wasn't weighed down with B or C plots, and even though it was a mini clip-show, I could sacrifice the few seconds lost by flashbacks (that I've already watched a handful of times), if it means that more people are jumping in to episodes and watching this show.

I really can't overstate how much I love the fact that Parks and Recreation stays true to character timelines, and how terrific the writers are at creating a believable relationship between Leslie and Ben (which is why, when we see Ron's over-the-top relationship with the Tammys, the juxtaposition is so freaking funny). Just last week I was already mourning the loss of Bleslie (yes, I just made that up), much like you do when you find out a longtime couple you were fairly good friends with called it quits in what seemed like a completely out-of-the-blue decision. These past few episodes, we really weren't shown what was going on in Leslie's mind during the breakup because it is literally part of her job and candidacy to set her feelings for Ben aside in order to fulfill her duties. Sure, "The Treaty" and "End of the World" gave us little glimpses of Leslie trying to make sense of it, but it wasn't until last night's "The Smallest Park" where she was finally honest with herself, Ben and, in turn, us.

Unlike Ben Wyatt, I was never in Model UN, but I imagine that throwing the Parks & Rec cast into this situation would be much funnier to me if I had been. Also, I, like Andy, would probably just sell all of my country's most valuable assets for everyone else's lions. In any event, as a non-UN-er, I still thought "The Treaty" was better executed than Community's similarly themed episode because I was actually able to comprehend exactly what goes on at one of these wacky things.

I hate apocalyptic predictions. I don't find them quite as funny as the rest of the Internet does, and mostly feel anger toward them rather than an urge to laugh and throw an end times party. I'm not even a fan of "If you had one more day on Earth" questions, and when I saw that last night's Parks and Recreation was titled "End of the World," I feared it would be a particularly awful episode. The good news: I was completely wrong (and there was barely even any Donna in it!). The show handled the subject really well without exploiting it too much for the sake of storyline -- after all, I wouldn't put it past Pawnee to have been run by a "freaky cult" in the '70s. I especially credit Ron, who replied to Leslie's confession that if this was her last day alive she'd want to spend her time with Ben by dryly remarking, "Well, that's significant. The problem is, Leslie, the world's not ending tomorrow -- the sun's gonna rise right over there. It'll be a regular Friday and you'll be in the exact same position you were in before." It grounded the story in reality and is just one of the many reasons I find myself lost in the drama of Parks & Rec sometimes. Let's talk about that and assign everyone completely arbitrary grades.