Helen, Alice, Martha, Skits, Truman, and T.D. excitedly watch as Carolina shows them a copy machine her father gave her. When it starts printing, Martha and Skits start growling at it, believing it to be alive, but the kids love the machine and start having fun making prints. Eventually, the dogs join in too, then Carolina gets the idea of making a newspaper called Carolina's Town Crier.
On the sidewalk, Carolina says that she needs reporters. The dogs want to be reporters, with Martha pointing out that she could smell out news, but Carolina doesn't want a dog reporter. Then, by the cafe, Carolina asks the kids who wants to make which section of the paper. Helen chooses arts and entertainment, Alice chooses sports, and Truman chooses the crossword puzzles, but Carolina wants him to do connect-the-dots instead.
Then, at the park, T.D. reveals that he wants to be an investigative reporter. Martha and Skits start digging in the park because they smell something, but Carolina is salty and says that smells aren't newsworthy. Helen wonders how Granny Flo gets the bubblegum into the lollipops they're eating, so T.D. decides to use that for a story. Truman points out that, as a businesswoman, she might be keeping the recipe a secret, so T.D. decides to sneak into the factory. He then imagines doing it and ending up chasing her down on rollerskates.
He bikes to the factory, with Martha and Skits following, only to find that the lollipops are made at a different factory in Alaska. Martha then reveals that what she and Skits dug up was a bone, but T.D. dismisses that idea as not being newsworthy. He then decides to interview the police and see if they have a story, but all they have is the plot of a book one is reading.
While Martha's dog friends go off to help her dig up the bone, T.D. continues to search for a story. His friends catch him spying on a mailman from the bushes, not realising that he's a mailman and finding it suspicious that he walks the same street every day and carries a bag. Helen explains that he's a mailman, but then Truman and Alice point out that their mailman has a moustache. Helen explains that Wagstaff City has more than one mailman.
T.D. still thinks that this mailman might be an impostor and goes to inspect his bag, but he ends up getting caught by the police and ending up on the news instead. Martha and Skits show up all dirty, and she invites the kids to check out the bone, but Carolina refuses. The kids walk off, except T.D., who is feeling down on himself for being a bad reporter.
Martha offers to show him the bone, and he goes along with it. Upon seeing the bone, it turns out to be a dinosaur bone, and ends up on the TV news. Carolina is initially disappointed that she didn't get to use the story in her paper, but T.D. agrees to put it there.
This episode provides examples of
- Bait-and-Switch: When a policeman talks about a money-making scam, the audience and T.D. are led to believe he's talking about a real case he investigated, but he's actually just talking about something in his book.
- Bannister Slide: In T.D.'s daydream, he slides down a bannister to chase after Granny.
- Comically Missing the Point:
- When Martha says that "Man Bites Dog" sounds like a terrible news story, Carolina agrees... but thinks it's because it's been done.
- When Truman says, "What is T.D. doing?!", Helen thinks it's a clue for his crossword.
- Evil Laugh: In T.D.'s imagination, Granny Flo laughs evilly before escaping out the window.
- Fantasy Sequence: When thinking of trying to get Granny Flo's secret, T.D. imagines sneaking into her factory and chasing her down.
- Foreshadowing: The bone being a dinosaur bone is foreshadowed by the fact that it takes a whole pack of dogs to dig up.
- Immediate Self-Contradiction: When Carolina asks Martha if her and Skits's story is about the bone, she denies it, but then immediately says, "Well, sort of. Yes."
- Irony: T.D. tries to get a story for the paper by inspecting the mailman's bag, but the police see him, so he ends up in the papers instead.Carolina: "You were supposed to get a headline, not be the headline!"
- Mirthless Laughter: Carolina laughs awkwardly when T.D. reveals that he will put the dinosaur bone story in her newspaper.
- Offscreen Teleportation: In T.D's imagination sequence, he's last seen inside the factory and then pops up in Granny Flo's helicopter the moment she tries to escape in it.
- Rhetorical Request Blunder: Carolina says that if Martha adds a story about a smell to the paper, they might as well add a story about people's garbage. Martha thinks that actually sounds like a good idea.
- Stock Animal Diet: Martha and Skits enjoy a bone in this episode.
- Tempting Fate: The kids repeatedly assert that a bone is not news... only for this bone to turn out to be a dinosaur bone.
