The Tonight Show with Jay Leno
DECEMBER 20, 1999 (NBC)

Christmas Gifts

JAY: Have you finished your Christmas shopping?

NORM: Oh, yeah, I’ve shopped for almost everything, I do it on the, uh, the uh, dot c—uh, emil—e, uh, ebay. . . I don’t know.

JAY: Yeah, whatever it is.

NORM: The computer.

JAY: The computer, you go on the compute—you shop on the computer.

NORM: Yeah, yeah. They just, uh, take your credit card, you know, and then they send you, uh, stuff, you don’t have to go out and Christmas shop.

JAY: Oh, you don’t, you don’t like, you don’t like to go to the malls?

NORM: Huh?

JAY: Don’t like the malls, do ya?

NORM: No, well, I, I kind of like the malls sometimes, you know. You know what’s fun to do at the malls?

JAY: What?

NORM: Uh, if you want to be, uh, popular with the young kids at the malls, give em—give em free cigarettes. They think you’re like the coolest guy in the world!

JAY: (laughing) Yeah, yeah.

NORM: Just tossing out cartons of old gold.

JAY: Yeah, yeah.

NORM: I—I’m shopping for a lot of things this year, I, I had trouble last year cause I got, do you ever get a gift, you know, for a dude, your friend, you know, and uh, then your gift that you get him, like is way worse than the gift he got you?

JAY: Yeah.

NORM: Like last year, my friend Ben Johnson, man, that guy give me a, uh, one of them laser disc, uh, whole laser disc thing.

JAY: Oh, sure, like a DVD player?

NORM: Yeah, yeah, with all—not, DVD, yeah, that’s it, not laser disc. It was really cool, you know, and I felt happy, and then I realized that he was about to open my gift, I got him a Chia head, right? So I knew it was horrible, I didn’t realize that he liked me so much more than I liked him.

JAY: Right, yeah whatever. Not certainly a sign of liking someone, spending more money on them.

NORM: Well, you know.

The Joys of the Lottery

NORM: I always used to get, uh, lottery tickets, but then I stopped doing that.

JAY: (laughing) Lottery tickets!

NORM: Yeah, you know, I figured, you go, you just get a lottery ticket, and it seems like a good gift, even though it’s nothing at all, you know? It seems like it could be something.

JAY: Yeah, yeah.

NORM: But you don’t want it to be something, the last thing you want—guy to win, you know what I mean?

JAY: Oh yeah, you don’t want that. You want it to be like a number off.

NORM: Yeah, exactly!

JAY: Oh, 9-8, oh.

NORM: That would be perfect. One time, I remember my dad, my, my aunt always, uh, I don’t know if this is funny or not, but my aunt always (audience laughs), I should think about it before I get at it.

JAY: Yeah, that’d be nice. Just a little bit.

NORM: But my aunt always got her lottery tickets, every week, you know? And she always had her numbers, she always played the same numbers? And uh, one week there, she couldn’t get to the store, and uh, my dad said, uh, well what the hell’s the difference, you know, if you don’t get it one week? She goes, "Oh, no, well those are my numbers, and I wouldn’t want, uh, uh, these are my lucky numbers and I wouldn’t wanna, to not do it this week and then the numbers come up." And then my father said "well if that happened, they wouldn’t be your lucky numbers!" (laughter and huge audience applause)

JAY: You know, I, I never thought of it that way, yes, kind of a wise old sage, your dad! I see you’ve got much of your influence and wisdom from your father.

NORM: Yeah, he’s a very wise man. He’s the guy that told me, no matter how bad things get, you can always drink whiskey.

JAY: Yeah, those old Canadian homilies, yeah, they’re fascinating.

What Norm Wants for Christmas

NORM: I’d love to get, and I’ve never gotten this, and I think it’s the perfect gift, is a Christmas tree.

JAY: Why can’t you just go out and buy a tree?

NORM: Exactly! But why can’t somebody give me one? That’s what I need at Christmas. That’s what I really need.

JAY: Yeah.

NORM: Hey, I thought of the perfect stocking stuffer.

JAY: What’s that?

NORM: A human leg! (Huge applause and laughter from audience)

JAY: Yep, yeah, that’d be nice, a lovely gift, lovely, lovely gift.

NORM: It would fit perfectly!

JAY: I guess you’re right, depending on the size.

New Year Resolutions

NORM: Well, New Year’s Eve, I always try to make a resolution, I made—couple of resolutions last year, they, they panned out, you know?

JAY: They did?

NORM: Yeah.

JAY: Well, that’s very good!

NORM: What I try to do in my resolutions, Jay, is, and I think a lot of people make this mistake, they’ll overreach.

JAY: Yeah, you don’t want, not that, overreach.

NORM: Yeah, they’ll say "I wanna lose fifty pounds," well come on, you know what I mean, you’re not gonna lose fifty pounds, or uh, oh, uh, I’m gonna be good to people, something, you know what I mean? JAY: Be good to people, that’s ridiculous!

NORM: Well, (laughs) sorry. So I like to just have a thing that I know I’m gonna, uh. . . .

JAY: You can attain.

NORM: Yes. So my last year I figured, uh, my last year’s resolution—get a haircut.

JAY: Get a haircut.

NORM: Yeah. So I got a haircut.

JAY: Right.

NORM: And uh, my other resolution was, uh, watch that show, uh, "Runaway with the Rich and Famous." (laughing)

JAY: But you couldn’t bring yourself to do that one.

NORM: No, I watched it!

JAY: Oh, you watched it? Yeah. "Runaway with the Rich and Famous," yeah.

NORM: Yeah. I watched one, man, it was a. . .

JAY: Is that still on? I wouldn’t think it would be on last year.

NORM: It was on, it was, I saw it like two months ago.

JAY: Was it in Canada?

NORM: No, no, it was here, they had, uh, it’s, it’s, you know, uh, you know, uh, "Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous."

JAY: Right, right.

NORM: This is like an offshoot, it’s called "Runaway with the Rich and Famous."

JAY: Oh, this is like, you take the money from the rich people and then you run away.

NORM: No, no, no, no, you run away, like, run away to a getaway, let’s go to a, a, a fam—uh, you know, a nice, uh. . .

JAY: A spa.

NORM: A spa, with a famous dude.

JAY: Okay.

NORM: Like I saw one. . .

JAY: So it’s a gay show.

NORM: No, no, no, no. (Audience laughter) The camera crew goes with the famous dude.

JAY: Oh, oh, I see, it’s not two guys run away and then go to a spa.

NORM: No, no, it’s Robin Leach, goes, and he go—you know, and so he’ll go (attemps Robin Leach voice) "Here we are in lovely Barbados, it has sunshine," I can’t do Robin Leach, you know.

JAY: Really?

NORM: (laughing) It has, it has sunshine, hehe, I’ll try a little harder.

JAY: It sounds like you’re doing Norm!

NORM: "It has, it has sunshine, and everything, everything but Tony Danza," and then they show Tony Danza, he comes in with the boat.

JAY: Was Tony on the, uh, on the rich and. . . ?

NORM: He was on "Runaway with the Rich and Famous." But, this year, for my uh, because I’m changing my resolution this year, because of the upcoming Y2K catastrophe.

JAY: Oh, yeah.

NORM: That I figure’ll wipe out a lot of the earth.

JAY: Really, you think so? So you. . . .

NORM: So my resolution this year is, don’t let anybody into my bunker no matter how long they kick on the door!

JAY: Really? Just keep it sealed?

NORM: No, it’s for me!

JAY: Yeah.

NORM: Maybe I’ll let my son in.

Homeless Bums

NORM: I feel for poor people sometimes, you know?

JAY: Really?

NORM: When I lived in New York, there was a lot of them homeless dudes, you know the, the mayor getting in trouble there with the homeless dudes.

JAY: Sure, Mayor Giuliani with the homeless, yeah.

NORM: Yeah. And I had my experience with a homeless bum there, I, I would never give money to the homeless bums there on account of. . .

JAY: The homeless bums? (laughing)

NORM: The homeless uh, dude—bums, ya know? And, uh, my—cause my mom always said "don’t give it to em, they’ll just use the money for crack." You know? And I figured, you know, you know, I don’t wanna give money and then they’ll, the homeless guys do crack with it, that’s terrible.

JAY: Right.

NORM: And also, it, uh, saves me a few bucks!

JAY: Right! (audience laughter)

NORM: And, at the end of your life, I, you, that could add up to maybe like a thousand dollars, if you don’t give, if you never give money to a homeless guy.

JAY: Right, right.

NORM: It adds up. Anyway. So, but I s-saw this one time, it was, it was Christmas, uh, uh, er, you know, time, and I said, "here’s a homeless bum there" I says to myself, "why don’t I, instead of giving this guy money, all he’s gonna do is buy crack with it."

JAY: To buy crack again, yeah.

NORM: Why not just feed the guy, bring him into a nice restaurant?

JAY: That’s very admirable.

NORM: And there was a diner near my place, and uh, prices were reasonable, so it wasn’t gonna put me out too much. I, I took a homeless guy, said "I’m gonna take you to this diner that I always go to," so I go there with him, you know, into this diner, sit down, uh, uh, to get m—a meal. Good God if the guy, uh, the, the unbearable stench of urine starts coming off this guy. So nobody wants that in a restaurant.

JAY: No, you don’t, you don’t want that.

NORM: So I’m like all right, everybody’s like, trying to eat, you know? So the guy orders his food, and I’m trying to talk to him. He starts telling me about how, this is his idea of a conversation, this guy, starts telling me about how, uh, Governor Rockefeller is poisoning the pigeons! Right, in the city! So I tell this guy, I go, "What are you, retarded?" I said, "Governor Rockefeller, I said, the governor of this state is Pataki! Governor Pataki!" He says, "No, no, you know. Huh," he talked weird, he was like (trying to do strange accent) "Huhhh, the, the pigeons." He says, "The pigeons are cleanest animal you ever seen," I go, "I’m not arguing with you buddy, but I’m telling ya, the governor’s name is Pataki!" It was unbelievable. He was crazy. He wasn’t, turned out he wasn’t retarded, he was, you know, "Whoowooo!" (tries to indicate that the man was crazy)

JAY: Well at least you were sensitive to that, I think that’s the important thing.

NORM: He was a good man, though.

Dick Clark

JAY: So what is it you’re hosting next month, the, some kind of music show?

NORM: American Music Awards with Dick Clark.

JAY: Oh, well that seems. . . .

NORM: That guy’s a young lookin’ guy, ya seen him?

JAY: He looks good, he looks very good.

NORM: Holy Lord God! I asked him if I could get some of his blood to drink! (audience laughter) I thought maybe that would make me young too.

Bowling Dog

NORM: That was three pin bowling.

JAY: Three pin bowling.

EMBETH: I know, he didn’t, we don’t have ten.

NORM: Oh, you don’t have ten?

EMBETH: We just have three, he chewed up the other ones.

NORM: Maybe if you do a couple more films!

EMBETH: (laughing) Don’t! Shut up!

JAY: You’re very cruel Norm!

EMBETH: That is awful! I don’t want to talk to him now.

JAY: Don’t you worry about him!

NORM: I’m just saying, how much could a pin cost?

EMBETH: Listen to me.

JAY: We’ll get, we’ll get her, we’ll get her seven more pins.

NORM: Okay, all right.

EMBETH: It’s not, it’s not the quantity, it’s the quality that counts.

JAY: That’s right, thank you, thank you (Elizabeth?).

NORM: So those were three quality pins?

JAY: Yeah! Exactly!

Thank you Liddy for transcribing this appearance.