MODERN FAMILY: Planes, Trains and Cars

After a short break, Modern Family returned with a new episode and brought back funny man Kevin Hart as Andre (who I hope to see more of in the future). We begin with Phil and Andre (Phil’s neighbor) at a car lot because Phil wants a new car. Andre gives Phil a little confidence boost and he ends up buying a sexy convertible sports car instead of the safe sedan he usually gets. Of course it is a great idea until they get home. Phil is expecting Claire to have a fit, but she doesn’t. She just said it was a beautiful car and went back into the house. Phil knows she is upset and wonders when she will snap.

Phil gets a call to pick up clients for work and realizes he won’t have enough room in his new ride for them to fit. Claire offers to switch cars with him as long as he picks up the kids while she runs errands. Phil is still anticipating her wrath but again she says nothing and he is totally confused.

Claire decides to blow off errands and take the sports car for a drive up the coast (after some guys complimented the car and told her it isn’t a car for errands). She was sick of being the responsible one. She stopped at the beach and had a blast. She was completely stress free, until she realized her car keys were gone. Uh oh. Phil shows up to give her the extra car key. He tells her how he learned so much about the kids just from driving them around in the minivan when they thought he wasn’t listening. They relax and decide to make a monthly trip to the beach together and tell everyone they are running “errands.”

Jay is taking Gloria and Manny to Pebble Beach to meet his old football buddies. He is so excited about this reunion and makes a point to Gloria that he is kind of a “legend” to these guys. He booked a private jet for the trip but didn’t inform Gloria until they were on the runway. Gloria refused to get on a little plane because it is too dangerous, so they end up driving. This is where the fun begins. They end up having car trouble and find a local mechanic who tells them they can’t order the parts until the next day. Jay is upset because it looks like they will miss the reunion. The mechanic (who was wowed by Gloria’s beauty) offers them another way to get there. He uncovers an old military helicopter that he restored himself. Gloria takes one look at that thing and was not getting in the “ticka ticka ticka ticka” as she called it (listening to her refer to the helicopter by the sound it makes was hilarious).

They end up at a motel; while Manny is taking advantage of the vibrating bed, Jay admits to Gloria that his friends didn’t really see him as a legend. Truthfully, they didn’t expect much from Jay. That is why he was so determined to get her there. He wanted them to see what a beautiful wife he had. Gloria was flattered by her trophy wife adventure and next thing you know, they were all headed to Pebble Beach on the military helicopter.

Cam and Mitchell decide to take Lily to Chinatown to explore the city. When they got off the subway, Cam accidentally tossed Lily’s favorite bunny onto a departing subway car (he was throwing it to Mitchell who was too busy putting on hand sanitizer). Lily is not a happy camper. Mitchell comes up with the idea to tell Lily that bunny called to say she should pick one of her other stuffed animals to play with. Lily is not falling for it. She wants Bunny.

They go back to the train station and hang “missing bunny” flyers all over. They see a homeless man sleeping with bunny in his arms. Mitchell tries to wake him when the homeless guy coughed, snorted and wiped his mouth on Bunny. Ewwwwww! They decide to let Bunny go after all, Lily will get over it just like Mitchell did when Jay lost his Luke Skywalker doll as a child. He turned out to be a great lawyer, but did he really get over losing the doll? Hmmm…the jury is still out.

Modern Family airs Wednesday nights at 9/8c on ABC.