‘Did the Chicken Cross the Road?’
Season 10, Episode 7 - Aired November 7, 2018
After Cameron worries he has lost touch with his country roots, he decides the house needs a barnyard animal. Alex is up for a government job and is nervous about her family being interviewed for clearance. Meanwhile, Haley and Dylan wonder whether it's time to act more like adults.
Quote from Phil
Phil: [aside to camera] Was Alex right? Had I been an unwitting... an unwitting spy? I even dug out an old article they'd done on me in a Russian newspaper during my trip. Sergei told me the headline said, "Young Tumbler's Mission of Friendship." A quick scan into Google Translate revealed the truth, "Famous Tumbler Denounces the West." I needed some fresh air to clear my head. Had I been that big a dupe in high school? And if so, what was stopping them from trying to use me again today?
Quote from Phil
Phil: Well, she does come by her wanderlust honestly. The kids here all know about my high school trip to the Soviet Union.
Alex: Yeah, but she doesn't need to hear about that.
Florence: No, please. Continue.
Phil: In the depths of the Cold War, my tumbling team was part of a cultural exchange. I became friends with a Russian tumbler named Sergei who wanted to hear all about the U.S. He asked me to... to send pictures when I got home, and not just touristy stuff. Sergei was interested in ordinary things. Uh, airports, um, power plants, train stations. His family was in the fence business. He said our military had the best fencing [chuckling] in the world. I must have sent him 100 pictures of the perimeter of Camp Pendleton.
Quote from Phil
Claire: If you really want to impress the interviewer, why don't you try casually leaving out this completed New York Times crossword that I found at the gym?
Phil: Why bring a knife to a gun fight? How about I lay out the family heirloom?
[aside to camera:]
Phil: 1931. Great-grandpa Ted Dunphy is driving south from Modesto one foggy evening. He picks up a stranded motorist and drives him to a gas station. The man has no money, so Ted pays for his gas. The man thanks him with a quick drawing on a cocktail napkin. For you see, that man... was Walt Disney. And this familiar fellow is Mickey Mouse.
Quote from Luke
Luke: Hey, Alex. Quick tip. Smile during the interview. I've been learning a lot about different personality types in my psych course, and you're kind of textbook borderline. All brains, no empathy.
Claire: You know, Luke, we are so very proud of all the hard work you're doing, and I look forward to hearing your insights when you finish chapter two. But for now, maybe you could just put that book away.
Luke: No surprise you'd say that. Controlling, obsessive... classic Commandant personality type.
Haley: Ooh, burn.
Claire: Oh, grow up, Haley.
Luke: Sadly, she can't. Such is the plight of the Peter Pan personality.
Phil: You're saying Haley refuses to grow up? I don't believe that.
Luke: Which brings us to another type, the Dreamer... head in the clouds, tends to be naive, gullible.
Phil: I love that you're smart now.
Quote from Dylan
Dylan: "Dead-end alcoholics... broken lives, and broken dreams..." Nope, nothing about Spider-Man. Must be a different Iceman that cometh.
Haley: That's okay. It could still be good. But, Dylan, you have to stop looking at the carnival over there.
Dylan: I'm sorry, but it just might be easier to enjoy this unsparing look at life's castoffs if I knew that afterwards, we were gonna walketh over there and goeth to the bumper cars.
Quote from Claire
Luke: Makes you crazy, doesn't it, Commandant?
Claire: No.
Luke: So you weren't about to straighten that chair? Because if the whole world isn't completely ordered, it feels like your skin is on fire?
Claire: This is literally armchair psychology.
Quote from Joe
Jay: Okay. So we both like to be in charge. But when it comes to Joe, can we both be on the same page? Like this morning when I was trying to get him to eat his vegetables? Back me up.
[aside to camera:]
Joe: I knew I should have thrown away those beets! Stupid. What am I, 4?
Quote from Haley
Florence: So, Haley, you tell us about Alex.
Haley: Well, it was not easy sharing a room with a genius. [Alex chuckles] She was always up reading and calculating, but she also inspired me. When I turned 21, I said, "Haley, time to be your own woman," and I moved into the basement.
Quote from Haley
Dylan: [answering phone] Oh, hey, Haley. What's up?
Haley: I'm kind of mad at my family, actually. They keep saying I have one of those Peter Pan personalities, so, um, change of plans. We're going to a play, not the circus.
Dylan: Wait, what?
Haley: Dylan, don't make a thing out of this. The elephant's not going to remember you promised to see him next year.
Quote from Cameron
Cameron: Okay, well, nothing happening yet.
Mitchell: Okay, you know, I want to see.
Cameron: No. No, no, no. Don't. [gasps] Oh, no. Oh, no. Something's come into the backyard.
Mitchell: What?
Cameron: I think it's a raccoon. Oh! Oh, the... Oh, the horror!
Mitchell: Oh, my God!
Cameron: No, no. No, she's fighting. She's fighting, Mitchell, with every fiber of her indomitable chicken-y spirit. And it's over. Oh, gosh. Well, that's the worst farm calamity I've seen since a dinner theater production of "Oklahoma!" starring Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Delete.