Diatribe of a Mad Housewife (S15, E10-323)

Because no one demanded it: the long-waited return of Dr. Marvin Monroe.

Plot Summary
Homer's reckless driving within the plant causes him to lose his job.  Homer finds employment at a used car lot as a salesman.  While there, he sees an ambulance on sale, and when he hears its siren go off, he decides to quit his new job and become an ambulance driver.  While this is happening, Marge and the kids go to a bookstore where Marge meets the author of a series of books Marge enjoys.  Marge gets inspiration from the author somehow, and decides that she can write a book as well.  She starts to write a story about the wife of a whaler, who she imagines is just like herself, and writes the whaler as a more awesome version of Homer.  However, Marge's vision of the whaler lessens when Homer shows a lack of interest in Marge or her book, fully absorbed in his new job.  Feeling neglected, Marge rewrites the whaler as a cruel drunkard who only treats his wife poorly.  Marge decides to add a romantic character who will attract the depressed housewife and models the man after Ned Flanders.  With her conflict set, Marge is able to finish writing her book.

Marge has Lisa preview the book, and Lisa notices that the drunken whaler is a lot like Homer, and advises Marge to have Homer read the story first.  Marge does so, but Homer gets distracted and ends up only reading two sentences, later telling Marge that he liked the story to cover his ass.  Marge is relieved and goes to publish the book, which occurs rather easily.  People across Springfield start reading the book and quickly realize that the main character in the book is a lot like Marge, making the connection.  Homer catches wind of this and finally gets around to reading the book (on audiotape), and learns that the whaler is basically him.  He confronts Marge over this, but before Marge has much of a chance to defend herself (or scold Homer for lying earlier), Homer rushes out angrily to find Flanders.

Ned freaks out over Homer's aggressive greeting, and drives off.  Homer catches up in the ambulance, forcing Ned to pull over.  With this scene mirroring the final scene of the book (where both men end up dying), Homer walks up to Ned... to ask for help in being a better husband.  Marge catches up to see what Homer is really doing, and is relieved.  Homer then declare that the two should 'collaborate on a new project', which is lingo for writing a book about who really killed JFK.

Quick Review
This was another okay episode, with nothing that great but nothing that bad.  Frankly, this scored better than I thought it would, as the scenes that focus on Marge's novel didn't detract from the episode as much as expected.

Final Score: 7.3