Season 3 Episode 16: The House That Peg Lost

Steve and Marcy go on holiday and ask Al and Peggy to house-sit, which given what happened in the previous episode is a remarkable act of faith. The Bundys loot the place, naturally, Al is still carrying the VCR he stole last week, but the real disaster is larger. A moving man turns up looking for a roadhouse, and takes the Rhoades’ house away. Al’s eventual report to the returning couple is that their home is now a chicken restaurant in Waukegan, an actual suburb twenty-four miles north of Chicago.

It is one of the most purely absurd premises the series ever committed to, and it works because nobody treats it as impossible. The house is gone; the paperwork was wrong; Al is not especially troubled. The episode’s attitude is that this is the kind of thing that happens to people who leave the Bundys in charge.

Kelly’s slumber party runs alongside, with Bud confined to his room, and the episode logs the boys Kelly has taken from her own friends by name: Dan Peterson, Greg Barnett and Bobby Brucato. Kelly confirms she is sixteen.

The looting turns up two durable pieces of Rhoades financial intelligence. Al and Peggy establish that the house is in Marcy’s name alone, and that Steve’s mother is the sole beneficiary of his life insurance policy, which Marcy had valued at a million dollars a few episodes earlier in “Requiem for a Dead Barber.” Peggy also produces a promissory note for sex that Al had signed, confirms the year as 1989, and observes that it is the year of the snake. She is probably not talking about the Chinese zodiac, though 1989 was in fact the year of the snake.

Episode Facts

• Original air date: April 9, 1989
• Season 3, Episode 16, and the 51st episode of the series
• Written by Steve Granat and Mel Sherer
• Directed by Gerry Cohen

Guest Cast

• Allison Barron as Lauren
• Tracy Justrich as Tasha
• Kristin Pearcey as Karen
• Laurie Shiers as Charlene
• Jonathan Coogan as the workman

Two Kinds of Looting

Watch what Al is carrying when he and Peg come back from stripping the Rhoades house. The VCR is in his arms, and he already stole their VCR the previous week in The Harder They Fall. The show is keeping count even when nobody says so.

Kelly confirms she is sixteen here, which is one of the few age statements in the series that lines up with the others.

Famous Quotes

• Kelly: “You promised that I could have another pajama party. It’s right here.” Al: “You can’t hold me to that. I thought I’d be dead by now.” Al, on his own undertakings.
• Peg: “While Kelly’s having her party, you will stay in your room. And you’re only allowed out for dinner… which means you’ll be in your room.” The sentence, and the loophole closing.
• Kelly: “Just pretend that it’s a normal Saturday night.” Bud: “If it was a normal Saturday night, I’d be busy selling low numbers to the guys outside your window.” The negotiation collapsing.
• Kelly: “Eat toe rot!” Kelly, out of arguments.

Notes

• The title plays on the Aretha Franklin song “The House That Jack Built.”
• Allison Barron returned to the show later as a different one of Bud’s visitors.
• Goof: Peg checks whether the Rhoades house is gone by looking through the front door glass, from an angle that would never have shown their house in the first place.