Man With a Plan – Winner Winner Chicken Salad

By: Ujjyani Banerjee

Adam (Matt LeBlanc) forgot to take his phone to the bathroom and is now getting bored, so he asks Andi (Liza Snyder) to ask him some trivia questions. Andi doesn’t like talking to him when he’s in the restroom. That was apparently one of the two conditions on which she agreed to marry Adam, the second being “no cheating.” Kate (Grace Kaufman) arrives with two of her friends and asks Andi to take them shopping for Spring Formal attire. Andi aloofly agrees. Adam observes how the teenagers seem abnormal. Just then, Teddy (Matthew McCann) comes in trying to flirt with the girls. Even though they pass by him giggling away, Teddy boasts about being checked out.

Seeing Andi sulk, Adam offers to take the girls shopping but to Andi’s surprise he was just being nice and not serious. As Adam leaves for work he finds Lowell (Matt Cook) eavesdropping from outside. In Lowell’s defense, it was like listening to an intriguing podcast. He informs Adam about Don (Kevin Nealon) not coming to work as he’s busy babysitting his grandson, Parker (Liam Risinger). Adam feels that Don is making excuses as Marcy (Kali Rocha) would naturally be doing that job, thanks to her maternal instincts from having food-producing body parts. Andi is taken aback by her husband’s sexist mindset, but Adam doesn’t back down either. He asks Lowell to make a pot of coffee at the office while he straightens it out with Don and joins him at work shortly.

Don is struggling to get Parker to eat spaghetti for breakfast. Adam walks in, surprised. Parker goes upstairs and Don shares about Marcy being down with food poisoning. Adam also speaks about the feminism fight he and Andi got into. He’s about to dig into some refrigerated chicken salad when Don stops him as that’s what got Marcy sick. Adam wonders why it wasn’t thrown out and learns that collecting trash is Marcy’s job while taking it out is Don’s job. Joe (Stacy Keach) and Bev (Swoozie Kurtz) arrive to see Parker, but when Don asks them to babysit they flee.

Marcy comes to take out her trash out, but Don asks her to throw it in the trash can. He wants her to babysit Parker as she must be feeling better now, but Marcy demands the weekend off to recuperate. Adam wonders if she’s actually gotten better and is simply playing with his thick-headed brother to evade babysitting duties. He suspiciously starts going through her trash and finds an empty pack of Cheetos. Just then Andi arrives. It turns out that she will be taking care of Marcy, which is why Adam needs to take the girls to the mall. Adam says no and shows Marcy’s Cheetos packet to her. Andi is appalled that he went through a sick woman’s trash. Adam now believes that Andi is in cahoots with Marcy and thinks of a retaliating game plan. He asks Don to eat the chicken salad, get sick and force Marcy to get out of bed.

Adam was indeed right as Marcy and Andi enjoy their day off eating Cheetos and watching TV. Andi complains about Adam’s sexist remark from earlier and Marcy hates him for thinking so lowly of women. Meanwhile, Lowell complains to Teddy about how Adam kept him and his pot of coffee hanging at the office. Don struggles to take the first bite from the salad bowl. Adam shares how he once pulled the same stunt when Teddy was infected with Strep throat. Apparently, no one was getting any sleep and Adam used Teddy’s toothbrush in order to fall sick, too. He got rewarded with ample rest for two days straight with an unlimited supply of jello. Don now feels inspired and starts gobbling until the food poisoning starts making its presence felt in his tummy. Adam wishes his brother hadn’t eaten so much, but now at the toughest part is done he wishes Don luck and returns home.

Kate comes to her dad complaining about Teddy who was apparently doing push ups in front of her room and now her friends think he’s weird. When Teddy talks about doing some curls next, Kate chases after him. Adam is proud of his son. Just then Andi returns home informing him about Don’s food poisoning which has now forced Marcy to babysit Parker. Adam is glad that Andi can now take the girls to the mall but Andi still declines. Before she can talk at length about it Adam locks himself in the bathroom. Joe arrives in the evening. Adam shares what shenanigans he and Don did to teach their wives a lesson. Joe is ashamed that his sons lack manliness and have reduced to poisoning themselves. Lowell storms in accusing Adam of keeping him hanging without any notice all day. Adam apologizes and promises to remain aware of his feelings from the next time. Joe couldn’t be more bemused. Marcy asks Andi to drop by and informs her about what their husbands did.

Andi gets the chicken salad home for dinner and offers it to Adam. Scared, Adam offers an excuse about having recently turned vegetarian. Andi decides to eat it by herself, but Adam stops her and realizes that she knows everything. They blame each other for having kept the truths and having evaded responsibilities. Andi wonders if they’re bad people. Adam calls it “being normal” and “flawed like everyone else.” They compare themselves to Star Wars’ Han Solo and feel better about themselves in no time. Adam decides to throw the salad into the trash and meets Don on his way.

Don apologizes for having spilled the truth ,but claims to have revealed just the Strep throat incident to Marcy. Andi overhears everything and is mad. Helpless and stuck, Adam takes a spoonful of the cursed salad. Andi soon caters to her sick husband and Teddy walks in donning a tuxedo. He is on his way to Kate’s dance and will try his luck with the crying girls outside. Adam beams with pride, but as soon as Andi notices he asks her to go stop Teddy. Andi refuses to do so as she can’t think without that specific body part that he and Teddy have. Adam knows that she’s loving this and he goes on to put some grey matter into Teddy’s brain!