vote

Maximum Homerdrive is one of my absolute most beloved episodes.

"It's you! You're him! You're Tony Randall!"

"And on time too!"
"Oh noooo, Homer, no!"

"Greenhorn?! Who's a greenhorn?! What's a greenhorn?!"

Maximum Homerdrive

Lisa announces that she is going to protest a new steakhouse which allows its customers to kill their own steak, which is called "The Slaughterhouse" (it is also decorated with hanging steer carcasses and a fountain of blood, and everything on the menu is meat - even the menu itself). Homer hears the name of the steakhouse and is astonished that nobody told him about what he thinks is an amazing place, and takes the rest of his family to eat there, where he enters a challenge with a friendly truck driver named Red Barclay. The challenge Homer and Red enter revolves around who will finish off a "Sir Loins-A-Lot" first, a 16 lb (256 ounce or 7.26 kg) steak that only two people in the history of The Slaughter House have finished (Red being one and Tony Randall being the other). The gargantuan steak is more than a match for Homer, as for once in his life he is unable to finish his food and breaks down crying. Red does, but dies seconds later of what Dr. Hibbert called "beef poisoning". This shocks the diners, before he reassures them that it was "probably from some other steakhouse" (Coincidently informing the Simpsons beforehand that he owns a fair percentage of the steakhouse). Homer then decides to finish Red's last delivery and brings Bart along with him, leaving the rest of the family behind.

Lamenting that Homer and Bart always get to go on exciting adventures, Marge says "Maybe it's time we took a walk on the wild side." However, she, Lisa, and Maggie end up going to a doorbell store to buy a doorbell that they install themselves, which plays The Carpenters' song "(They Long to Be) Close to You". Lisa wants to press the doorbell, but Marge insists that they should let visitors do the ringing first. Unfortunately, they barely get any visitors and they never get to ring for various reasons (Milhouse is trying to sell birdseeds, but is attacked by birds, some Jehovah's Witnesses were about to ring the doorbell when they reconsider their careers). Marge desperately tries to order garlic bread from Luigi's to get someone to ring the doorbell, but unfortunately the delivery man, who is Wiseguy, prefers to knock on the door and leaves when he hears that Marge is not interested in the garlic bread. Finally, Lisa gets fed up and rings the doorbell herself. However, the new doorbell starts to malfunction, playing the song over and over without stopping.

Meanwhile, Homer goes to get some pills that will keep him awake overnight. He takes an entire bottle of pep pills, followed by a bottle of sleeping pills to balance it out. In the truck, he alternates between being hyper to being drowsy until he finally falls asleep at the wheel, almost heading off a cliff. The next morning, he awakes to discover a secret: the truck drove by itself with its Navitron Autodrive system. He talks it over with other drivers, who inform him that he should not mention anything about the truck driving by itself. The truck's Autodrive system also helps keep itself safe. To demonstrate the system, Homer and Bart sit on the hood. A passing bus notices this, and Homer outright tells them about the autodrive system and its nature as a secret scam. Another truck driver notices this and informs the other truckers about the situation.

Back in Springfield, Marge tries to cut the wires to the doorbell, but discovers that Homer has stolen her tools, so she decides to just pull the wires out, but makes it worse by making the doorbell to speed up and amplify itself, disturbing the whole neighborhood.

Homer and Bart are enjoying themselves until an angry mob of truckers get in a showdown with Homer, and he survives without the help of the Autodrive system, which had ejected itself from the truck by managing to get the truck to jump over the others. The truckers briefly consider giving up scamming before deciding just to bootleg Beanie Babies. Homer and Bart finish the shipment of Artichokes and migrant workers by taking it to Atlanta, but they still need transport home. The Lord provides one, as a freight train full of napalm headed back to Springfield needs a driver (as the original driver had quit because he didn't want to deliver a train full of napalm to Springfield).

Back at the Simpson house, the doorbell's tune grows so annoying that an angry crowd has gathered. Chief Wiggum is about to shoot it until the doorbell store's mascot, Señor Ding Dong, uses his whip to silence the noise from the doorbell. Everyone in Springfield is thankful for him, and Señor Ding-Dong attempts to make a dramatic exit, but his Chevrolet van is malfunctioning and he is instead forced to ask for jumper cables.


Lisa's Wedding

The episode begins with the Simpson family visiting a renaissance fair. Homer eats eight different kinds of meat, and an embarrassed Lisa wanders off and eventually finds a fortune-telling booth. Although Lisa is at first skeptical, the fortune teller gets her attention by telling Lisa the names of everyone in her family. She then uses tarot cards to predict Lisa's future, and says she will tell Lisa the story of her true love.

The story then shifts to an Eastern University in 2010 (at the time of the episode's broadcast, fifteen years in the future), where a now 23-year-old Lisa meets a English student named Hugh Parkfield. At first, the two quarrel over a book in the library and their respective academic talents, but the pair eventually fall madly in love. Hugh invites Lisa to come back to his home in England so she can meet his parents. While there, Hugh asks Lisa to marry him; she immediately accepts.

The next day, Lisa calls home to tell Marge of the news; Marge promises that she will prevent Homer from ruining the wedding. Marge is still a housewife, Bart (now 25) works as a successful building demolition expert, Maggie (now 15) is a teenager who wears a necklace with her pacifier attached and apparently never shuts up (although each time she opens her mouth in the episode, she is interrupted) and Homer still works at the Springfield Nuclear Power Plant in Sector 7G, with Milhouse as his supervisor. Lisa and Hugh travel to Springfield, where Lisa is worried that her family will embarrass her. Things get off to a bad start when Bart and Homer accidentally set the British flag on fire, which they extinguish by throwing it on the ground and pouring compost on it.

At dinner, Lisa plans on going for a wedding dress fitting and Homer decides to take Hugh out to Moe's Tavern. While there, Homer presents Hugh with a pair of cuff links (a bride and groom pig) that all Simpsons men have worn on their wedding day, asking him to continue the tradition; Hugh reluctantly agrees to wear them during the wedding. Later that night, Lisa apologizes profusely for her family's behavior; although Hugh says it does not bother him, he appears worried. On the day of the wedding, Homer talks with Lisa and she discovers that Hugh did not wear Homer's cufflinks. She finds Hugh and asks him to wear them. He agrees. The only condition however, is that after the wedding Lisa must leave her family behind because Hugh has felt embarrassed by them all along. Lisa is outraged, stating that she cannot marry him if he cannot understand that she still loves her family despite their shortcomings, and calls off the wedding, running off in anger and sorrow.

Back in the present, the fortune teller says that Hugh went back to England and never saw Lisa again, and that there is nothing Lisa can do to prevent it — although she should "try to look surprised". Lisa questions the fortune teller about her "true love" and the fortune teller reveals that although Lisa will have a true love, she "specializes in foretelling relationships where you get jerked around". Lisa leaves the booth and finds her father, who is excited to tell her about his day at the fair. They walk off, hand in hand, as Lisa listens, happy and content.

Lisa's wedding.

Maximum Homerdrive is an easy vote for me.

No really strong feelings about either of these.

you'd feel different if you ever saw a real esquilax

you have no soul

I sold it to buy some dinosaur sponges.

Seriously, though: I love most of the flashback episodes (when Homer and Marge are in high school, when the kids are babies, etc.) because of how sweet and funny they can be. I think the flash-forward schtick is ham-fisted and the jokes are easy. And there's an episode of King Of The Hill where they drive a truck, and it's just so much better than the Simpsons truck episode (but that's the one I voted for).