- Mark: Honestly, Leslie, it's going to be a long uphill battle. You are going to be super-annoyed with all the people who want you to fail. There is a sea of red tape, endless roadblocks. So, yeah, I don't know. I don't know.
Leslie: Screw it. I'm gonna try to do it anyway.
Andy finally gets his casts off. At a ceremony at the Parks Department, Ann thanks Leslie for their help and Andy invites everyone to come to a local bar to hear his band play a show. Unfortunately, Leslie can't come because her mother set up a meeting with a "political big-wig", George Gernway, the city manager of the neighboring town of Eagleton, who can help with the park project.
Mark receives congratulations from a fellow city planner for getting a bothersome speed bump lowered two inches. He isn't sure how to feel about that.
While at the hospital handing out flyers for the rock show, Ann learns from Dr. Harris that Andy postponed getting his casts removed for two weeks, hence why he's been especially clumsy while relearning how to walk. Realizing in increasing anger that he did this because he wanted her to keep waiting on him, Ann begins reevaluating her relationship with Andy.
While everyone else is at the bar, Leslie meets with George, a much older man, asking him for advice about her park project. She realizes that he thinks this is a date. She calls her mom, who admits it was a date, not a meeting.
At the bar, Mark makes the rounds of his friends, all of whom are paired up with someone. Tom introduces his wife Wendy, Ron is out with his ex-wife Tammy's sister, Beth, who also hates Tammy, and April is with her gay boyfriend Derek. He feels like a "seventh wheel".
Leslie tries to get back to business, but George dismisses her and tells her he just wants to have fun.
Ann shows up at the bar, wanting to talk to Andy, but he's busy setting up. She storms off, and Andy simply starts playing with his band.
Leslie is growing annoyed with George, who asks her about her favorite movies for the second time that night. Asking if he's keeping her from something, Leslie tells him about the rock show. George suggests they go.
As the concert goes on full swing, Mark and Ann talk. When she starts complaining about Andy, Mark questions her relationship with Andy and starts complimenting her appearance. Ann, already in a bad mood, shoots down Mark, who insists he isn't hitting on her even though he is. Ann gets up and leaves.
When Leslie and George arrive at the bar, the show is over. Andy knows Ann is angry at him and plans to stay in the bar because Ann won't yell at him in front of other people. He even offers to give an encore for Leslie since she missed the show, but Ann drags him home. Everyone else leaves, including George, who was falling asleep. Leslie starts to leave, disappointed in her bad night, but an intoxicated Mark asks her to stay and have a beer with him. Leslie's spirits are lifted and she notes the parallels between tonight and that night from five years ago.
When the bar closes, Mark and Leslie get some beers and go to the pit. After sharing some jokes and mulling over the inevitable uphill battle facing Leslie to turn this pit into a park, a drunk Mark starts to kiss Leslie, but she stops him. Meanwhile, Ann and Andy fight and when he admits he delayed his cast removal because he liked her serving food to him, she kicks him out of the house. As Andy leaves the house, he sees Mark fall into the pit. He gets Ann to come take a look at Mark, and while Ann is out of the house, Andy goes back in and starts watching television.
Tropes
- Above the Influence: When they're both drunk and not in the best emotional place, Mark and Leslie start kissing but she breaks it off, saying she doesn't want it to "happen like this again" (meaning, she doesn't want a repeat of their brief drunken hookup from five years prior).
- All Take and No Give: Ann finally realizes her relationship with Andy is this, and learning that he delayed getting his casts removed by two weeks because he liked having her wait on him hand and foot is the last straw that convinces her to break up with him.
- Alone Among the Couples: Played for Laughs with Mark feeling like a "seventh wheel".
- Blatant Lies: Mark insists he's not hitting on Ann, but Ann can see straight away that Mark is making moves on her.
- Bookends: Andy got drunk, fell into the abandoned pit behind Ann's house, and broke his legs, prompting Ann to make a complaint to the Pawnee government, kicking off the series. This season ends with Mark getting drunk, falling into the pit, and badly hurting himself.
- A Good Name for a Rock Band: Andy rattles off a Long List of these that his band formerly used.
- Characterization Marches On: Leslie's "date" is a city manager from Eagleton, whose professional advice she seeks before it becomes clear that he's looking for romance. A few seasons later, Leslie wouldn't be caught dead talking to anyone from Eagleton for any reason.
- Ron is much less reserved and willing to let others see him dancing and enjoying himself at the show, at odds with his carefully cultivated reputation as The Stoic in later seasons.
- Deadpan Snarker: Dr. Harris.Ann: But he told me that you told him he should wait.Dr. Harris: No, he rescheduled. Said it was personal, that he'd explain later, but then he never explained.Ann: ...I have waited on him hand and foot for two months.Dr. Harris: Well, I guess that explains it.
- The Last Straw: Ann was already becoming sick of how she's had to support Andy financially and generally be his surrogate mom, but finding out he delayed the removal of his leg casts just to keep her waiting on him for two more weeks is what pushes her to decisively break up with Andy.
- Laser-Guided Karma:
- Turns out Andy could've gotten his leg casts removed a full two weeks earlier, but delayed it just because he liked having Ann wait on him. Naturally, Ann is not at all happy about this and leaves him.
- Mark hits on Ann before she even breaks up with Andy. Then he gets drunk, falls into the pit, and badly hurts himself.
- Long List: Andy lists all of his band's previous names. They're currently going by MouseRat.
- May–December Romance: It doesn't go anywhere, but George is old enough to be Leslie's father, with his youngest son from his first marriage being her age.
- Sarcasm-Blind: When Ann tries to confront Andy about delaying his cast removal.Ann: Andy, we need to talk.Andy: Hey, we're just about to start. Could you grab me a triple whiskey water?Ann: You would like that, wouldn't you?Andy: Yep.Ann: You have two perfectly good legs, get it yourself.
- Senior Sleep-Cycle: George falls asleep in the bar. Tom even wonders briefly if he's dead.
- Ship Tease:
- The very first seed of this between April and Andy is planted in this episode when April says she "gets it" concerning Andy's band's music.
- Subverted for Mark and Leslie. They drunkenly flirt and kiss, but Leslie backs out of it and ultimately, the ship is sunk.
- Shout-Out: Tom jokingly says George has Benjamin Button disease.
- What Does She See in Him?: With regards to Ann and Andy's relationship. Lampshaded by Mark when he admits the relationship makes no sense to him. Ann herself realizes the others have a point about her relationship being unhealthy and finally breaks it off.
