Modern family Season 3 Episode 09 Phil : Oh, my goodness, those hands are cold! At least buy me dinner first! Luke : Boom! Claire : Tell my wife and kids I love them. Phil : Oh, my God. Luke : That's kind of dark, mom. Claire : What? Phil : Wait, what's my favourite hospital food? Claire : Ummm. Phil : Jell-o! Hey buddy. No, today's still good. Claire : Good for what? Who's buddy? Phil : Yeah, just head on over the house. Claire : Whose house? Who's buddy? Phil : Ok, see you in a couple. Claire : Couple of what? Who's buddy? Phil : Kenneth. Claire : Kenneth? Phil : Kenneth! Phil : If I had a son, I'd want him to be like Kenneth Ploufe. Claire : You do have a son. Phil : When we first moved in here, he was the sweet kid who lived next door. Claire : Mm, the weird kid who lived next door, but Phil always had a soft spot for him because Kenneth sort of looked up to him. Phil : I wouldn't say hero. Claire : And yet you did. Phil : Well, you weren't going to. Claire's always had some issues with Kenneth. Claire : He would stare at me a little too long. Phil : Can you blame him? You used to dress sexy back then. Kenneth : Ten years. Can you believe it? Claire : Mnh-mnh. Kenneth : I feel like we ended that last hug too soon. Come on again! Claire : Oh, wow, that's a lot of hugging. Phil : Oh! She's right. Why hug when you can... Man-shake. Kenneth : Man-shake. Claire : I'm gonna get the coffee. Claire : "Man-shake." Are we sure? Phil : Roll up the curtain. Bing! [OPENING CREDITS] Natalie : I don't know what's worse... that he competes every Thanksgiving in a pie-eating contest, or that he's 9-time runner-up. Andy : It wouldn't be Thanksgiving without the contest. Natalie : Yes it would. Cameron : I think I have to tell my punkin chunkin story. Mitchell : Oh, no, no, you don't have to. Cameron : No, I kind of think I have to. Mitchell : Once, Cam and his friends tried to slingshot a pumpkin across a football field. Three seconds. That's all he needs to tell that story. Cameron : So the fog was rolling in over the mountains like an ominous blanket as we readied the giant slingshot. You know, Lorna, the pastor's daughter, she was nervous because like I said, it was after curfew. She was a goody two-shoe. Only pastor's daughter I ever met that was. So we finally launch the pumpkin, and it sails through the air, goalpost to goalpost... past the end zone, into the parking lot, through the open roof of Lorna's dad's car. I turn to Cody and I say, "now what are the chances of that landing there?" He says, "where?" And I say... "The sunroof of a preacher man." Mitchell : Wah-wah. Manny : Okay, come on in! Voila! Gloria : Ah! Jay : Okay, what are we looking at? Manny : My centerpiece for Thanksgiving. Gloria : It is wonderful. You're so talented. I can't believe that you did this. Manny : Yeah, my juices were really flowing on this one. I actually shot a making-of video. Hey, maybe we can watch it later at the party. Jay : Well, yeah, that or football. Gloria : Mi amor, I'm so proud of you. Is there nothing in the world that you can't do? Jay : Centerpieces, for starters. Gloria : Shh! Jay : Why do you say everything of his is great, even if it isn't? Gloria : Because I'm building him up. That's what parents do. Jay : Too much, if you ask me. Kids cross the street nowadays, they get a ribbon. Manny's got plenty of confidence. He just needs a little reality check every now and then. And this thing is a horn of ugly. Gloria : Shh! My mother used to criticize everything I did. And look at me now. I am a jumble of insecurities. Jay : I'm not getting that. Gloria : Do not say a word to Manny. Jay : Fine. But trust me, if you told him the truth, he'd thank you later. Gloria : Mm. Like Claire and Mitch? Did they thank you? Jay : Not yet. Gloria : Mm. Jay : No. But it's coming. Kenneth : Ah! So many memories in this place. Phil : Yeah. Kenneth : Do you guys still have, like, every cereal? Luke : We have a lot. Kenneth : Yeah! Of course you do. Of course you do. You only have the greatest dad in the world. Phil : So what have you been up to? I haven't seen you since you went off to college. Kenneth : Oh, you know, actually, that didn't work out so well. I bounced around for a while. Ended up washing dishes in New Mexico. Claire : Mm, so without the benefit of a college degree, I guess your options were kind of limited, huh? Haley : Ease up. It's a holiday. Kenneth : Yeah, it was... it was tough. Oh, no. No, thank you. Thank you, though, sweetie. You're so sweet. Claire : Oh. Okay. Kenneth : It was tough for a while... Claire : Mm-hmm. Kenneth : But then a roommate and I started our own business. Claire : Oh, was that also in the dish or cleaning industry? Kenneth : No. No, no, no. It was actually a small investment company. Well, small at first. You know, we rode the tech wave for a while, then expanded into video games, amusement parks, sports arenas. Anything that seemed awesome, really. I'm actually in town to buy a blimp. Phil : Holy crow. Haley : Ohh. Wow. So if you... if you'd gone to college, you would have done all that just four years later, or... or never. Claire : Alex really needs to be picked up, sweetie. Why don't you go get her? Haley : I wanna hear more of what he has to say about... Claire : We're leaving. Phil : Kenneth, I am so proud of you. You really made it. Kenneth : Well, I did get one pretty lucky break. Early on, I met a very special guy who taught me that what I thought and said had value. Luke : Oh, you mean like... Phil : Shh. Luke. Let the man talk. Kenneth : He encouraged me to always find the fun and follow this thing. Claire : Your lung? Kenneth : No, my heart. To this day, at every crossroad, I ask myself one question... what would Phil Dunphy do? Phil : Record scratch! Kenneth : Oh, that's me buzzin'. Oh, it's Paris. She's my assistant in Tokyo. You'd think they'd know how to demo 4-D gaming graphics without my help. They don't. Hey, Luke, what instrument does yo- yo ma play? Um... cello? Phil : He's me... And he's spectacular. Alex : Oh, my God. Kenneth Ploufe is part owner of a resort in the Bahamas, some cruise line, and Lacy Fair, that lingerie company. Haley : Oh! Ew! I'm wearing one of his bras! Alex : Look, he's got a model in his lap. Haley : No way. Alex : Look at her. Haley : This is your fault! Alex : This is your fault! Haley : Are you seriously gonna stay in here all day? Alex : I can't face mom. If I see her, I'm gonna have to confess. Haley : Take a breather. It's just a dent. And saying nothing is not lying, okay? It's just letting the truth speak for itself. Alex : This is not the time for moral equivocation. Haley : Okay, I don't know what that means, and also, don't tell me. Alex : You're the one who's gonna lose her driving privileges. I don't know why you're so calm. Haley : All we have to do is keep it from mom until she goes to the store. Then, when she sees it, she'll assume that it happened there, which it did, so it's not really lying. Alex : Listen to you. Are you gonna be a career criminal? Haley : Ugh. You sound like mom. I don't know what I'm gonna do after High School. Mitchell : It was a supportive "wah-wah." I was trying to save the moment. Cameron : There's no such thing as a supportive "wah-wah." A "wah-wah" by its very nature is vicious and undercutting. Mitchell : Well, I was just trying to salvage that story, okay? I told you not to tell it, you told it, and it died. Cameron : It did not die. It's a thinker. Mitchell : Cam, the only thing people were thinking was, "thank God this story's over." Cameron : Okay. I get it. So how long have I been embarrassing you with my stories? Mitchell : No, no, no, no. You don't embarrass me. I love your stories, okay? The tractor in the swimming hole? Aunt Betty's wiglet on the piglet? Cameron : Uncle Carl said she couldn't tell 'em apart. Mitchell : See? Those are funny. You have so many great ones. Cameron : Well, that's farm life. Rain or shine, there's always a bumper crop of stories. Mitchell : Yeah, I'm just saying maybe you take punkin chunkin out of the rotation. Cameron : I guess you're right. Maybe I could just... Mitchell : Yeah, stick to the ones that really happened, because people love those. Cameron : Excuse me. What? Mitchell : I'm... I'm just saying people laugh more at stories that are true.