Having bought Marge the same thing as Bart for Mother's Day Homer goes to Sprawl-Mart, and he buys her a "Kitchen Carnival" on the advice of Patty and Selma, a machine that produces cotton candy, caramel and deep fried things. Eventually Homer uses it to make a giant ball of deep-fried, caramel-covered, cotton candy. The ball is much too big for the family to eat, and it gets dirty. Finally Marge insists Homer should get rid of it. He takes it to the dump, and is confronted by a large, angry grizzly bear, from which he cowers. The bear eventually wanders off without attacking, apparently disgusted by Homer's tearful cowering. The incident becomes well known due to a nearby hunter with a camera.

Homer becomes a nervous wreck, hallucinating and seeing bears everywhere, like: Winnie the Pooh, Paddington Bear, Little Bear, even a crowbar-wielding Care Bear, etc. To make things worse, a tape was made of him cowering from the bear in the news, and his coworkers and Bart's friends make fun of him incessantly. Grampa tells him to confront his ursine assailant, and Homer eventually does so, contacting a hunter named Grant, who has revealed to place an electrical prod on the bear to exact his location. He then makes a suit of armor out of household junk. Refusing Marge's insistence that he not fight the bear, he sneaks out of the house, is joined by Bart, Lenny and Carl, and goes to fight the bear.

The four of them make camp in the woods. As his homemade armor is hot, Homer eventually takes it off and bathes in a stream, where he is again attacked by the bear. With Bart, Lenny and Carl dancing to the radio and paying no attention, the bear drags Homer to his cave. Deciding to die facing the bear as a man, Homer later discovers that the bear is only angry and hostile because of the painful electrical prod that Grant attached to his ear. To make sure of it, Homer takes the tag off the bear and tries it on himself, resulting in lot of pain before taking it off. Because of being freed from the electrical prod, the bear reverts to its friendly state, licking Homer and giving him a bear hug as a thanks.

For the rest, just watch the episode :P