In the piano-making town of Grand, Pennsylvania, Janice Pasetti keeps house for factory owner Harris Weldon, his newlywed niece and her husband, while raising her teenage daughter.
Janice's estranged husband calls after having gone out for cigarettes three years earlier.
Tom's attempt to win back his job is marred by Carol Anne's suspicion that he's having an affair with Janice, who allows herself and Edda a designated period of depression to deal with the divorce.
Lunching together, Carol Anne and Janice clear things up between them, but find there's still a problem they both share. Meanwhile, cable TV viewers are offered the philosophy of Norris.
There's one little thing that Tom never told Carol Anne about his past, and it's just arrived in Grand, behind the wheel of the Porsche that smacked into Carol Anne.
Bonding in the woods, Tom and Dylan get tips about fathers and sons from Norris, while surgery-bound Desmond imparts a surprise on the same topic to Weldon.
With Eddie in town to celebrate his glory days of yore, Janice has a knee-jerk reaction to his glory days of now; and Dylan leads Edda astray.
After Wayne's father is shot by a deer, Tom sets about networking at the funeral, while the widow falls under the official scrutiny of her son.
Weldon tries a cosmetic change for Carnegie Hall. Norris channels the spirit of a genius. Japanese bikers throw Tom's future off track.
In New York, Janice hears history repeating itself. While at Carnegie Hall, George Bush and Leonard Bernstein are replaced by Dan Quayle and Plafka Dobra.
Janice compares rashes with Edda's Romeo. Norris finds all you need is love to avoid a career as a dead comic. Tom is tempted by an offer from Japan.
Norris succeeds in business without really trying. Wayne proposes to Janice. A secret admirer arranges to meet with Carol Anne.
Weldon's plans for Plafka are stabled. Janice gives Wayne a maybe, and learns the cause of her rash. Carol Anne yields to men's tears and Tom sees his $1.1 million turn into $46,853.
Aspiring beaus are dismissed by the Pasetti women. Desmond and Weldon square off in the name of love. Carol Anne plans a tryst while Tom plots his takeover of Eastern Europe.
