As the family drives home from the water-park, they get stuck in a traffic jam. While each family members tries to deal with heat, stress and boredom in their own way, Dewey is roaming the country on his own.

When Francis shows up a week late for Halloween, he and the boys still manage to create the ultimate prank; Hal tries to catch a man who keeps speeding down the street, which leads to Lois and him stealing the car.

When the boys demolish Lois' meager hopes for a happy birthday, she runs away from home.

The night shift at Lucky Aide is held hostage by two robbers, since Craig does not want to give up the combination for the store's safe. Francis tries to help a heartbroken friend at the academy, while Hal and the boys fight nature at home.

Lois finds an amazing and cheap massage table at the grocery store and manages to become so relaxed that she doesn't even care about Hal and Dewey's LEGO city.

Hal feels like his job is a piece of crap after going to Dewey's class for parent job day. So he decides to take a "kidney failure" weeks off. While Francis is forced to work at the lucky aid over spring break.

Lois' estranged parents, Ida and Victor, pay the family a visit. Right away, trouble starts brewing. Victor bonds with Reese, Ida gets Malcolm into a fight, and Dewey is haunted by childhood memories of his inattentive grandparents.

When Lois is arrested for having 16 unpaid parking tickets, she makes Francis pay for them and fights the cop in court for falsely accusing her of something she never did.

Francis organizes a hunger strike to get back the academy's TV, taken away by Commandant Spangler. Meanwhile Malcolm has to go to the hospital, leaving him in the children's ward and the family without their genius middle son.

Francis makes Reese and Malcolm fight each other and suck up to him for wrestling tickets. In the meantime Dewey takes care of Craig's cat Jellybean while he is gone to a comic convention.

The boys and Stevie take off in the evening to visit the carnival but get into trouble, while the parents go searching for them.