The Simpsons are employed as cartakers at Mr. Burns remote estate. Before leaving, Burns and Smithers kill the cable TV signal and remove all beer from the prermises. Deprived of his two favorite things, Homer slowly goes insane. He threatens Marge, who locks him inside a pantry. Homer is dragged out of the pantry by ghosts. Using a telepathic power called "the shinning," Bart contacts Groundskeeper Willie. Willie arrives at the estate to help, but is instantly killed by Homer. Chasing his family through the snow with an axe, Homer discovers Willie's mini-TV set. His urge to kill subsides.

While fixing a toaster, Homer gets sucked into a vortex and is whisked back in time to a prehistoric jungle. He accidentally kills a mosquito and, in doing so, alters the coarse of time. When Homer returns to the present-day, he is horrified to learn that Ned Flanders rules the world. He travels back and again changes history. Returning to the present, he finds that Patty and Selma have just died but that no one has heard of a donut. Homer travels from past to present continuously in search of normalcy. He settles on a universe where his family eats with froglike tongues.

Pricipal Skinner sentences Bart to detention in the school cafeteria. When Bart's fellow students begin disappearing one by one, he and Lisa suspect that Skinner and Lunchlady Doris are cooking kids and serving them as cafeteria food. As the student population dwindles, Bart and Lisa try to escape, but they are cornered by Skinner and Doris, who slowly back them into a giant food processor. Bart awakens from his nightmare only to find that he and his family are turned inside-out by a mysterious fog.