Now that Ellen has decided to stay in Clark, she has to think what she'll do with her life. Mr. Munn offers her a position as counselor at the school, but she doesn't think it's the right job for her. So she goes to a pond and tries to read the book ""Walden"", but it's way too boring for her. Later she runs into a suspended student and the two start to throw fruits at Clark's statue and get arrested. While waiting downtown, Ellen talks to the kid, and realizes she might be better in counseling than she thought. Ellen takes the job and becomes the new counselor at the school.

When Ellen finds out that a P.J. Knockers is opening in Clark, she tries to start a petition to stop Clark from being invaded by all the chain stores and lose its small town aspect. But everybody seems blinded by the wonder they think a new restaurant will be. To make things even worse, Catherine quits her job and becomes a waitress at P.J. Knockers, and it takes Dot to convince Ellen to support her sister and ease off on the protest. Meanwhile, the new home economics teacher, Pam, takes over Ellen's office and turns it into a mini bakery room.

Faced with what could be raccoons digging up their front lawn, Ellen calls a raccoon guy to get rid of the problem. Dot, on the other hand, thinks she can take care of the problem herself by scaring the raccoons away with her high-pitched singing. The raccoon guy decides to camp in the lawn, and Ellen discovers Rusty making the holes. Turns out he was just trying to find the time capsule he buried so the raccoon guy wouldn't find it. He made the capsule as a love proof to Ellen, his old high school crush, and just dug it out to show Ellen that he too can do crazy things for love, just like Tug, one of the students who fell for Ellen. But Ellen assures Rusty that they're nothing more than just good friends.

Ellen entices Catherine by telling her how much money she could potentially make by selling her delicious candy, and the Richmonds decide to go into business together with Ellen as the ""idea"" person and Catherine as the talented taffy maker. But soon Catherine realizes that all the fun has gone out of taffy making now that it has become more of a job than a hobby.

Meanwhile, Ellen's fellow high school teachers are dismayed when they realize that the town of Clark doesn't even appear on a local map

Ellen doesn't have any students to counsel, because the entire school seems to be in a good mood. So she snoops around until she finds one student that may need some help: Tug, the football team's kicker. Even though Mr. Munn forbids Ellen to bother Tug, she insists on doing so and approaches his dad, trying to fix a fragile father/son relationship. Meanwhile, Ellen's a little annoyed with the cheap products of the house, a result of Dot's economic way of life. Since she won't take money, Ellen tells Dot she won a $500 prize, which she uses to bet on the football team.