Season 4 Episode 23: Yard Sale

Al works out that his wife has been systematically buying other people’s discarded possessions for more than a decade, from yard sales across all four corners of the neighborhood, and that the accumulated result is in his house. The remedy is obvious and the family commits to it: they will hold a yard sale of their own and convert the junk back into money.

Nobody comes. What follows is a series of escalating attempts to attract customers to a driveway full of things nobody wanted the first time, including Bundy Burgers, which had previously been forced on people and are here refused even by strangers.

Al’s explanation for the failure is the best piece of economics in the series. Yard sales, he says, run on the Bigger Idiot Theory: you are relying on a bigger idiot coming along to buy what you already know is worthless. The flaw in the theory is left hanging, and it does not need stating, because the whole family is standing in the driveway when he says it. The episode also contains the Dog Dream, a recurring fantasy in which Al wants to be Buck, and Kelly’s response to catching him mid-dream is to pat him on the head and tell him he is a good boy. He lifts his head and smiles. As a season closer it is unusually low-key. There is no stunt, no location, no guest star of consequence, just the family standing in their own driveway failing to sell their own belongings. After a season that had taken them to Las Vegas, a music video shoot and a wrestling ring, ending on a driveway reads as a deliberate choice.

Episode Facts

• Original air date: May 13, 1990
• Season 4, Episode 23, the season finale, and the 80th episode of the series
• The last episode in which Peggy smokes
• Written by Sandy Sprung and Marcy Vosburgh
• Directed by Gerry Cohen

Guest Cast

• Alex Walters as the statue
• Andrew Steinfeld as Tom
• Kate Morrison as Alice
• Josh Carroll as Mark
• Brent Corman as Freddy
• Cynthia Sullivan as Mildred

The Bigger Idiot Theory

Peggy smoking was a fixture of the first four seasons, visible in the season 3 opening credits. This is the last time the show does it.

Marcy gets one of the bleakest pieces of backstory in the run here: her parents sold off her possessions when she was thirteen, including a dog, to fund a weekend trip to the mountains that they took without her.

Al is shown paying the household bills at the top of this episode and at the top of Raingirl two episodes earlier, which is as close as the series got to establishing a routine for him.

Famous Quotes

• Al: “Yard sales are based on the Bigger Idiot Theory. Junk that is so dumb that a bigger idiot won’t come along and buy.” The business model.
• Kelly: “What’s with dad?” Bud: “He’s having the Dog Dream again.” A recurring condition.
• Kelly: “Good boy!” Kelly, to her sleeping father, who lifts his head and smiles.
• Al: “I wanted to be a football player. Now I just wanna be like him.” Al, indicating Buck on the floor.

Notes

• Marcy mentions it has been three months since Steve left and volunteers more detail about him than anyone asked for.