The Final Page, Part One

The Final Page, Part One is part one of the sixth How I Met Your Mother Christmas special. It is followed by The Final Page, Part Two.

Plot
While the gang is at MacLaren's, when Marshall and Barney order the same drink, at exactly the same time, Marshall "jinxes" Barney. Future Ted then explains that five years earlier, when Barney broke a jinx set on him by Marshall, he got hit by a bus. Since then, Barney started taking jinxes very seriously and began jinxing others. The gang then celebrate jinxing Barney for the first time in many years. Barney applauds them and asks them to say his name (to break the jinx), but Ted tells him that this will be a long jinx.

With the construction of the New GNB Headquarters finished, Ted decides to call his architecture professor from Wesleyan, Professor Vinick, who once said that his building design was terrible and that he "would never be an architect", to invite him to the opening to show him that he did become an architect. Marshall says that Professor Vinick is Ted's "pit guy", which Lily explains is someone that a person has been obsessed with for so long that they would throw them in a pit in their basement like in The Silence of the Lambs. Ted says that he would never do that, and Robin sides with him, saying that there is no one that she hates so much that she would throw them in a pit. But Lily says that Patrice, Robin's co-worker who is dating Barney, is Robin's pit person. Marshall and Lily further say that they would be the "pit persons" of Daryl LaCoutre, an acquaintance from Wesleyan, who become obsessed with them after playing a game of hacky sack with them in freshmen year. Lily says that Daryl is still obsessed with them and keeps trying to contact them.

Later, Ted gets an RSVP from Professor Vinick, declining the invitation, since he doesn't recall Ted. This makes Ted furious, he and decides to drive to Wesleyan, accompanied by Marshall, Lily and Barney, to confront Professor Vinick. At Wesleyan, Ted sits at the back of a class taught by Vinick, thinking about how to confront him, but is impressed by the lecture he is giving. After the lecture, Ted sees Vinick, telling him that he is an old student of his and shows him a drawing of the GNB building, but Vinick says that it is hideous and again tells Ted that he will never be an architect.

Meanwhile, while at Wesleyan, Marshall and Lily run into Daryl, who lives down the street from the Wesleyan campus and has a hacky sack stand at Wesleyan, called "The Three Hackmigos", after him, Marshall and Lily. Daryl invites Marshall and Lily to his house to "give them something". He takes them to the basement of his house, making Marshall and Lily scared as they think he is going to murder them, which they blurt out when he returns with his hands behind his back. However, Daryl tells them that he only wanted to give them a check for a hundred thousand dollars for coming up with the idea of "The Three Hackmigos" with him. Lily apologizes to him for acting like idiots and tries to accept the check, but he says it's fine and he doesn't need the their validation since he is doing great. He then tears the check, instead of giving it to them.

When Lily tells this to Ted, who has made a 3-D model of his building to get Vinick's approval, he realizes that he doesn't need Vinick's approval, and is about to throw the model of his building when Vinick sees him, and tells him that it's sad that he made a model of his building to prove some sort of point, but when Ted tells him that he was about to throw it away, Vinick doesn't believe him.

At World Wide News, Sandy tells Robin that it is time for year-end reviews and that they get to fire some people. Robin tells Sandy that unlike him, she doesn't fire people for personal differences. However, she sees Patrice's files and calls her in. She realizes that Patrice is indeed in her pit and decides to fire her. When Patrice asks her why she is getting fired Robin makes non-work related excuses, like no one should be as happy as her and that her cookies are only "pretty good". Before leaving her office, Patrice asks Robin if is this is really about her, but Robin tells her that it's not and Patrice hugs her. Robin apologizes to her and tells her that seeing her with Barney has brought back some old feelings and she doesn't like feelings, but she tells her that that is neither her nor Barney's fault, it's just hard seeing them together. She later tells Sandy that she didn't fire Patrice.

On their way back from Wesleyan, when Marshall and Lily get out of the car to get some snacks, Barney shows Ted an engagement ring, which causes Ted to say Barney's name, thus ending his jinx. He tells Ted that he is going to propose to Patrice, and when Ted reacts to this, Barney jinxes him. He tells Ted that he would surely tell him that he is moving too fast or over-correcting, but he is not. He was slept with a lot of women and this has left him feeling nothing but broken, but with Patrice, for the first time in his life, he feels settled and happy and he wants to feel this way forever. He says the following night, on the roof of the WWN building, Patrice's favorite spot in the city, he is going to propose to her. He tells Ted that he will unjinx him if he doesn't try to talk him out of this nor tell this to anyone else. Ted agrees to these conditions and Barney unjinxes him. When Marshall and Lily return, Barney tells them that he tricked Ted into unjinxing him, and in turn jinxes them. He asks Ted if he has anything to talk about, but Ted says he doesn't.

Trivia

 * The events of this episode take place immediately after the events of the previous Christmas special, "The Over-Correction".