Of course, like many good Simpsons episodes, we began in a place that had very little to do with the remainder of the half hour. The water park jokes at Wet 'N' Wack World (formerly the John F. Kennedy Naval Museum) were right on the mark. Homer: "Sure, they have worse rides than amusement parks and less fish than aquariums, but the parking is ample." The extended bit with Slimu (the octopus version of Shamu) was also quite successful. While the family was enjoying their water show, Abe was left alone on a shark bench until Marshall Goldman arrived. Goldman was a reporter specializing in human-interest stories, and he was happy to listen to Abe tell one of his nonsensical, unbelievable stories. ("Someone's listening to me! Now I know how a radio feels.")
Abe's ramblings, of course, have been running gags for The Simpsons entire 20 years. Usually we would just get snippets of a story before Grampa Simpson fell asleep, or before whoever was with him interrupted him. These bits are generally fun, with the more successful ramblings coming from the more successful episodes of the series. One of my favorites has always been, "We had to say 'dickety' because the Kaiser has stolen our word 'twenty.'" Extending the stories here could have been a big misstep, but the writing was sharp and funny. And it was also helpful to have Abe's stories (true or not) presented in flashbacks. The flashbacks added some very funny visual gags to Abe's already chuckling inducing tales. The newspaper headlines during his story about the Tinsel Town Starliner stood out the most: "Curly to Shemp: You're Out" and "Bike Wheels Now the Same Size."
Tuesdays With Morie writer Mitch Albom did a fine guest spot in this episode parodying his book. He showed up to try and steal Abe for his own book, but decided instead to follow Ralph Wiggum around after hearing him state, "Clouds are God's sneezes." Goldman's articles were received well, causing Homer to become jealous of the fact his father had never shared these stories with him. Home's computer-themed explanation of why he has no recollection of the countless times Grampa did share his stories was cute, but I prefer seeing Homer's brain monkeys. Still, his anger led him on a funny path. First he proved to Marge that he could never be angry with himself and the resulting mirror bit was classic Homer. Next he set out to find a surrogate father, which turned out to be Mr. Burns. This was another great segment and included a hysterical reference to another long running gag in The Simpsons. Having had enjoyed himself with Homer, Mr. Burns chose to only release a hound.
The story was given its conflict when Homer learned that Goldman was going to kill Abe in an attempt to bring a touching ending to his planned book and bid for a Pulitzer Prize. Like most great Simpsons episodes, the lunacy found room for sentimentality as Homer saved his dad and was then given the floor to tell his very own rambling tale. This was actually an unexpected sweet moment as Grampa Simpson passed the torch to his son… in a truly Simpsons fashion. The secondary story with Bart caring for a class stuff lamb over the weekend was effective and had a few great parts. The best of these was how much Nelson loved that little lamb: "Nelson loved a little lamb/He kept me nice and sane." Overall, the episode was a success, using one of the best Simpsons running jokes to tell an engaging and even sentimental tale.