• Directed by: Rich Moore
• Written by: Jeff Martin
• Airdate: November 15th, 1990

    While working on mowing the lawn, Homer is invited to Ned’s home for a beer. There, he takes Ned’s usual niceness as Flanders’ way of telling him that his own family is better than Homer’s. Homer is offended and argues with Ned until Ned asks Homer politely to leave. As the days go on, Homer continues to have a grudge against Flanders, to the point that Ned himself begins to get annoyed.
    When both Bart and Todd show an interest in mini-golf, the two are signed up for a tournament by their fathers, in a way to up the other family. Homer pushes Bart on winning and emphasizes that losing is not okay. Ned and Homer, during an argument, make a bet that the loser’s father would have to mow the winner’s lawn in their wives’ best dress. Eventually, Lisa helps Bart in doing well at mini-golf through Zen.
    On the day of the tournament, both boys are evenly matched and head into the last hole with a tie. The two each take shots, with both of their golf balls stopping a few feet short of the hole. The two reveal their feelings about the tournament to each other and decide that they will give up, ending the game in a draw. When Flanders’ approaches Homer to congratulate him, Homer says the bet is still on. The two mow each other’s lawn in their wives’ dresses. Unfortunately for Homer, Ned enjoys the experience.

    Though not the most quotable or oft-remembered episode, it does deal with something many of us may have gone through when we were young. Being pushed by adults to succeed, children tend to become overwhelmed and stressed, mostly because they cannot keep up with the pace of the work they are given, and with the pace that their parents insist that they work at. Unfortunately, many times, such as in this episode, we see that the push for success is not for the child’s own good, but for the parents to look good through their offspring.

    The reason for Bart’s own decision for entering the contest is given as one line; “Cool, everyone who enters gets a free balloon.” Though Bart may be a bit too old to be so fascinated by a balloon, it gives a great outlook as to how a child thinks. They don’t enter contests because they want to win 1st price, they enter contests because it entertains them, involves something they enjoy, or simply gives them something to do to pass the time. Looking at the episode as a whole, you can see that if Homer had not gotten into this jealous fit over Flanders, and was a bit more insightful, he could have seen that Bart was truly talented in miniature golf, and he could have become a pro, bringing home prizes to add to his shelf, and this may have made Bart feel better about himself (as we see that he has nothing close to a first prize on his shelf, one which contains a trophy for “Everyone Gets A Trophy Day”). Instead, Homer turns Bart against something he loves and may have become good at, only because he (Homer) is so clouded by the jealousy over a goody-two-shoes neighbour.

    It’s interesting to see Flanders fall into the same pit as Homer, though not as serious. You see, in the brief scenes that are shown, that Ned is embarrassed about what he has done, and is doing, and he is doing this only in hope that Homer finally shuts up. But Flanders also falls more into the loop of winning, and soon becomes a mirror image of Homer, without Ned noticing this himself.

    Also, the subtle bonding between Lisa and Bart is really well crafted into the episode. Lisa understands what Bart is going through, though his is in a different form as what she tends to experience. Homer doesn’t show any interest in what Lisa’s hobbies are, and barely supports her through them in his aloofness. Here, Homer does show interest in Bart’s hobby, but for all the wrong reasons. Lisa helps Bart from quite possibly fully hating miniature golf by teaching him herself. We have seen episodes where Lisa and Bart do good deeds for one another, but this was one of the first times when we see Lisa go out of her way to help Bart. We are usually led to believe that they don’t have anything in common with each other, but, in reality, they have more in common with each other than not.

    The ending of the episode gives us the perfect payoff. Both Bart and Todd realize that they do not enjoy doing this because they have to, but because they want to. They admit the fact that they are uncomfortable being a part of nothing more than a jealousy contest and walk away, opting not to take the route that their fathers have. In the end, the kids turn out to be more mature than the adults.

Favourite Quotes And Bits:
5) Bart’s blank expression when hitting the ball— “Tree falling in the woods…”
4) Mrs. Lovejoy: "Honey, wake up. It sounds like Ned Flanders is having some kind of crisis."
     Lovejoy: "Probably stepped on a worm."
3) The entire back and forth in Bart’s room between Homer and Bart is genius, from the “violin….guy,” to the naming of the bat, to staring and hating Todd’s picture for 15 minutes.
2) Lisa: "It’s times like this I’m happy dad has little to no interest in anything I do."
1) Lisa (watching Homer and Flanders mow the lawn in drag): "Why do I get the feeling that someday I’ll be explaining this to my psychiatrist?”