Episode 8F14
Written by David Stern
Directed by Mark Kirkland
Also starring: Maggie Roswell
Special guest voice: Phil Hartman (as Troy McClure)

Premise: The pressure of her family's constant moaning, questions and reliance takes its toll on Marge and she flips out on the freeway. The cure - a solitary pampering holiday at Rancho Relaxo. This leaves Bart and Lisa stranded with Patty and Selma while Homer 'looks after' Maggie.

Features: Patty, Selma, Krusty the Klown, Barney, Troy McClure, Chief Wiggum, Kent Brockman, Eddie, Lou, Otto, Lenny, Carl, Nelson, Mayor Quimby, Arnie Pie.

Couch: The Simpsons land on all fours in a pyramid fashion, with Marge and Homer at the bottom, Lisa and Bart in the middle and Maggie at the summit.

Trivia:

• Patty and Selma live in apartment 1597.
• There is a beauty salon in Springfield called Le Pamperie and a jewellers called The Family Jewel, as well as an English themed garage known as Buckingham Palace, complete with a cockney-accented, busby-wearing guard.
• Maggie falls asleep atop the Phineas Q Butterfats ice-cream parlour.
• Rancho Relaxo is Springfield's only Health Spa (although Marge takes nearly an hour's train journey to get there).
• Marge's hair tops six feet, and her criminal number is 50763.
• Movies available at Rancho Relaxo are Thelma and Louise (which Marge selects), The Happy Elves Meet Fuzzy Snuggle-duck and The Erotic Awakening of S.
• The activities in which she takes part are bungee jumping, kayaking, calligraphy, cigar making and hula dancing.

Homage: The episode starts with a pastiche of Warner Bros' Roadrunner/Wile E. Coyote cartoons as Homer chases Bart around the house. In freeze-frame, we learn that Bart is Brat'us Don'thaveacow'us whilst Homer is Homo Neanderthal'us.

The music Homer gets on the phone while trying to find Maggie is Baby Come Back, a 1968 hit for The Equals. This is the first time we discover Patty and Selma's devotion to McGyver, a rather banal American series starring Richard Dean Anderson as a survivalist problem-solver and crimebuster who uses 'brilliant improvisation' to win the day.

Hi, I'm Troy McClure, you may remember me from: Today We Kill, Tomorrow We Die, Gladys the Groovy Mule, and Calling All Quakers.

Mmmmm: ...strained peas.

Look out for: Homer's disastrous attempt to look after Maggie supplies many great moments, including his pathetic puppet show.

Notes: After the first few minutes, this episode becomes less about Marge than the family's reliance on her. Bart and Lisa's torturous time at Patty and Selma's is wonderful ('Richard Dean Anderson is gonna be in my dreams tonight!' says Selma of McGyver), but it's Homer losing Maggie, and working out what to tell Marge upon her return, that provides the best jokes.