Norm McDonald’s Fatal Attraction

A day in the life of an ex-SNL cast member

Shakespeare once wrote somewhere “hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.” But he’s never met Norm MacDonald. The Impious Digest’s star reporter Joe Mahma pays Norm McDonald a visit to file this special report.

The show wasn’t taping and he was in a Brentwood apartment he rented that overlooked O.J. Simpson’s house. Not one minute passed by when Norm wasn’t talking about Simpson. Simpson this, Simpson that, blah blah blah You sort of got the feeling that if Simpson was lynched, the world– at least in Norm’s eyes– would suddenly be a better place to live. It was as if Simpson died, there would be a cure for cancer and all the evils of world, an end to world hunger, and maybe, just maybe, men would finally be able to have babies.

Well, to be fair, Norm did have one other obsession. And when he wasn’t yammering on about the trial, he was at the phone– using his infamous Bob Dole impression to crank call the White House. Today, as usual, he went through his phonebook giggling like a little girl. As he did so, I went to the window, and peeked into Norm’s massive two ton Hubble telescope to take a view at what he found so interesting. I stepped up the scaffolding expecting to find the telescope aimed towards a distant galaxy or constellation somewhere. Maybe a comet. Instead, it was a view of O.J.’s bathroom– complete with infrared night vision.

“Norm, the neighbor’s toilet is the wrong place to look for Uranus– you’ll just find someone else’s.”

But this was technically star gazing…just the most disturbing kind. Indeed. the surrounding area was strewn with bits and pieces of paper. Each piece had a rejected Simpson joke scrawled hastily upon it. E.g., Knock knock. Who’s there? Orange. Orange who? Orange you glad I’m not that murderous Satanic bastard O.J. Simpson? Curiously, even these scraps were doomed to be recycled. They were in a large box marked “Forward to Tonight Show c/o Jay Leno”. As bad as these quips were, a chill went up my spine. Somehow I knew they would be used in Leno’s monologue.

A familiar cackling voice pierced my reverie.

“I’ll be back in a second,” Norm said. I’m going to use the neighbor’s bathroom. The plumbing’s shot here.” But rather than go next door, Norm took a stroll down the street to O.J.’s house to use his bathroom. Then he came back with a couple of rolls of toilet paper that he stashed in his jacket.

“I don’t get it Norm. First he lets you use his bathroom, and you repay him by squeezing his Charmin.”

“You ignoranus!” Norm cried as he fixed himself a Shirley Temple. “He’s a murderer. Go to hell.”

It was a curious sight. There he was, standing there, affectionately caressing the toilet paper, pressing it tenderly against his cheek…closing his eyes, smiling in a dreamy bliss. Then he saw me. He must have noticed, because suddenly his tone changed. He became defensive.

“Could you believe it?” he suddenly blurted, showing me the tissue rolls.

“This was the last thing to touch that murderer’s ass!”

“So?”

“So let’s call a press conference and burn it on pay-per-view!”

“Wasn’t he acquitted?”

“He’s a murderer. I know from my own personal experience, Norm said bitterly, “that he’ll stab you in the heart for fun!”

He then became so tense that the glass in his hand shattered without his noticing. Norm’s eyes began to glow demonically like red hot lumps of coal.

“Yes, he stabs people in the heart for fun! Like when he won’t sign your football and won’t answer your letters; like when he takes the nude pictures you mail him in implied and loving confidence, and they’re returned by the police with a restraining order!”

Eventually, Norm got through the White House operator. He put the conversation on the speakerphone so we could both hear.

“Hello! Chelsea? Bob Dole speaking.”

“Hello, Mr. Dole. How are you?”

“Bob Dole is fine. Bob Dole has never been better, heh heh. But I do think there’s something you should know. I really hate to be the one to tell you this…it’s almost too terrible to believe.”

“And what’s that?”

“Are you sitting down?”

“Yes, I’m seated.”

“A House Select Committee on Executive Misconduct—eh—has—eh—concluded today that your dad killed Vince Foster, is a practicing Homo-Sapiens, and eats Big Macs made from aborted fetuses. I’m sorry, little girl…but you won’t be seeing your father for a very long time.”

“Mommy says Vince Foster had it coming. And yes, my dad is a homo sapiens, he is a human being, as far as I know. As for the Big Macs made with aborted fetuses… they’re called Egg McMuffins, you fucking gimp. You’re a sick, sick man, Mr. Dole!”

“That’s right! and don’t forget to tell your friends in the media—Bob Dole needs to be stopped!”

“Please, Mr. Dole—get some help.”

“Maybe you can help me, then.”

“How?”

“Tell me something I need to know.”

“Okay….”

“Hey Chelsea—what are you wearing?”

“Later, Mr. Dole.”

“Bob Dole wants to know what you’re wearing! Hey—Bob Dole is standing here naked, and as an American, Bob Dole has every right to know what you’re wearing!”

Suddenly Norm saw me at the big-screen telescope monitor, which I accidentally flipped on when I mistook it for cable television. He ran over, shut it off, then slapped me and told me not to touch his new telescope— “Don’t touch that! It cost me two billion dollars!”

Then I slapped him back, because he should’ve posted notice the view might feature the Juice in the middle of taking a crap. Or rather, a view of Simpson’s frantic search for the toilet paper which Norm stole moments earlier—and a grim view of the worst possible demotion of a hand towel.

“Hey, Norm, you really are cruel. What if somebody wants to dry their hands on that towel?”

There was a knock at the door. It was the mailman, and he came with a sack of letters. But it wasn’t fan mail. They were undelivered letters to O.J. Simpson.

The mailman scratched his head as Norm dragged the sack into the room.

“Hey Norm” he finally said with the sincerest empathy, “maybe he has a girlfriend…”

“Mind your own business, you meddling postal slut!” Norm screeched as he slammed the door in the mailman’s face. On the coffee table near the telescope a tender love letter to one “Sweet Ebony Master” lay unfinished—damp with tears. I knew better than to ask. Five minutes later, though, the doorbell rang again. There was a guy at the door with two hookers in his arms. He had a purple polyester suit, silk shirt partially unbuttoned to show off his gold chains, and white platform shoes. His hat had a feather in it.

“Norm MacDonald?” he asked, a gold tooth mesmerizing Norm momentarily.

“I am he.”

“Pimp-Slappogram from O.J. Simpson.”

Before Norm could answer the pimp slapped him like a five dollar whore. Then when he was done, he gave Norm a reassuring hug, and his card. “Have a nice day, bitch!”

A New Tattoo

Alas, his manhood had been challenged, so we immediately went to a tattoo parlor, where Norm wanted to add some detail to this big, gruesome tattoo on his chest that had a Satanic, hoofed Simpson stabbing Nicole with a pitchfork. The tattoo artist eyed him, proud of his earlier work.

“Can I interest you in a talking tattoo?”

Always trendy, Norm was interested. He added an electronic implant to give his tattoo sound effects—an altered chip from a Hallmark talking card with a robotic voice screaming “DIE HONKY BITCH, DIE!” when he squeezed his right nipple or farted.

The tattoo artist was proud to note that Jay Leno got the same tattoo earlier that day—in mural form on the back of his freakishly huge BeetleBorg™ chin.

By late noon we went surfing. I insisted on it, but soon regretted it. Once at the beach, as Norm wistfully signed his beloved’s name in the wet sand with his big toe; a crowd gathered, and I was finally forced to ask him if he always wore thong bikinis when he surfed. Predictably, he growled and said to mind my own business. Then I asked him how he could misspell O.J. After correcting his spelling, he stammered “It’s for the aerodynamics,” pointing to his skimpy swim wear.

“They do this in France, you uncultured bastard.”

“Your tattoo clashes, that’s all. So does the chest hair. I’m sorry. I’m a friend.”

“I respect your honesty, but it still hurts. And if you so much as imply that I’m gay I’ll whip your ass.”

Norm went surfing anyway, and soon the tall, lurching stick figure in the loose-fitting thong bikini ran back, wailing like a banshee. The salt water shorted his fresh tattoo. It got swollen and the grisly picture became eerily three dimensional, with the tattoo of O.J. now repeating “DIE HONKY BITCH, DIE!” like a mantra because the chip shorted somehow. After a few hours of that infernal electronic shrieking, I finally had to sock Norm in his bony chest to disable the chip. It was a disturbingly pleasant experience, and just for good measure, I repeated the favor several times.

When Norm at last regained consciousness, we took a drive to Simpson’s house. Someone took his favorite parking spot in Stalker’s Alley, and Norm was furious. It was Barbara Walters. Also there was Mark Fuhrman, Rupert Murdoch and the John MacLoughlin Group digging through his trash looking for incriminating evidence. Walters was looking into empty cans with a magnifying glass while John MacLoughlin harassed Simpson with a bagpipe serenade. And there was a puzzled expression on Walters’ face.

“Hah! I knew it! Well, I see I beat you this time, you withered old hag!” I looked in the back seat and saw the missing trash bags.

“Norm, you need help man.”

“Damn that decrepit centurion! She knows this is my spot!”

“Are you gonna get out?” I asked as he set up his post, peering through his binoculars as O.J. worked in his garden, saw him, and flipped him off before he put on some ear plugs.

“Are you kidding? He’ll cut my head off. Aren’t you afraid he’ll cut your head off? Am I alone on this?”

“I didn’t steal his trash.” But Norm could barely hear me over the noisy bagpipes. He finally stepped out of the car and approached John MacLoughlin as the offensive pundit lifted his kilt for Simpson. Then the NBC pundit broke into a disturbing bagpipe rendition of Marvin Gaye’s “Sexual Healing.”

“SHUT UP!” thundered Norm. “You’ll scare him away, you skirt-wearing freak!”

The tone deaf MacLoughlin paid no mind—and even his loud, gruff voice was almost drowned out by the bagpipes…

I can’t shake this feeling

I want Sexual Healing

Sexual Healing, baby, it’s good to me

Suddenly, Norm took out a pistol and shot a hole in the bagpipe billows. Then he walked back to the car as MacLoughlin broke into tears. Minutes later the flatulent pundit blamed an immigrant for his troubles and fetched his accordion. Resigned, Norm sighed and wrote another poem to be stacked among the undelivered, tacit sentiments that weighed so heavily upon his heart.

But glancing curiously over his shoulder, I saw the poem titles alone discouraged further inquiry: “Killing Me Softly with his Dong”, “I’m Your Crack, Baby” and “Come into My End Zone.”

“Hey Norm, I really think you have a crush on O.J. No man can spend this much time so preoccupied with another man, and not betray the wrath and venom of an unrequited love. Why don’t you just tell him?”

“I do not have a crush on Simpson!”

“Do to! Hey man, when I was dating my wife I didn’t spend this much time thinking about her!”

“My aberrant fixation is perfectly natural. He inspires my humor; my creative juices!”

“Creative juices, or love juices?”

“Shut up!”

“Your humor? or is it in fact the pain of tender but impossible longings—if you can’t have him, no one else will, is that it? Is that why you feel so compelled to attack the man through such petty barbs and slander?”

“No, I think you have a crush on him!” cried Norm defensively. “Earlier I saw you wistfully carve his name on a park bench, and remember when we went surfing at the beach and you wrote his name in the sand with your big toe?”

“I was thinking up new material!”

“Right. You’re starting to creep me out, MacDoofus. And hey—stop gazing dreamily at my genital area!”

“I was looking at your zipper!”

“Were not!”

“Was to, you homophobe!”

“I’m not afraid of you, Norm.”

“See? That’s what I mean! If you call me a fag just one more time I’m gonna hit you with my purse!” And so it went throughout the day, until someone finally called the police and he was arrested for indecent exposure.

“But they do this in France!” Norm insisted. “You see any street signs in French?” the arresting officer asked finally.

“If you do I’ll let you go.” Norm looked around and saw none. “Hey—I had some French’s mustard on my hot dog a few minutes ago!”

“Transvestites can use the nude beach. There’s children here. Please get in the car. I mean, please get in Le Car.”

“Officer, I am not gay!”

“Surrrrrre.”

“Oh, the thong– it’s for the aerodynamics—helps me surf faster.”

Of course, there’s wasn’t a surfboard in sight. But such things mattered little to poor Norm, I thought, as the squad car peeled away…