Denis Leary: Death

I'm sick and tired of my generation getting blamed for the state of the planet. I'm sick of my generation getting called the TV generation. "Well all you guys do is watch TV." What'd you expect!? We watched Lee Harvey Oswald get shot live on TV one Sunday morning, we were afraid to change the fucking channel for the next thirty years. "This show sucks." "Yeah, but somebody might get shot during the commercial. Now hang on!" That's what's wrong with this country. We always shoot the wrong guys. We shoot JFK, we shoot RFK, and it comes to Teddy, we go, "Ahh, leave him alone. He'll fuck it up himself, no problem. You know?" Biggest target in the whole goddamn Kennedy family. He weighs about seven thousand pounds. You could shoot a bullet in Los Angeles and hit him in the ass in Boston five minutes later. He'd be standing on the lawn at the Kennedy compound going, "Ah-ah-ah-ah, there's a bullet in my ass! Ah-ah-ah-ah!"

Ted Kennedy. Good senator, but a bad date. You know what I'm saying, folks? One of those guys who gets home at four o'clock in the morning and goes, "What did I forget? Oh! The fucking girl! What's the matter with me? Jesus, where are my pants!? Holy shit!"

Because I'll tell you folks. We got a real problem with guns in this country. We have people snapping almost twice, three, four, five times a year. Right? People just snap. They can't take it anymore. They just snap, they go into McDonalds and kill fifteen people. I mean, what the fuck is going on down at the post office? Every six months some guy gets fired, comes back and kills all his co-workers. If I worked at the post office as a supervisor, I wouldn't lay anybody off for the next twenty-five fucking years. I'd just walk around going, "Hanrahan, what're you doing?" "Nothing." "Well, keep it up, you're doing a great job! Jesus. I'll tell ya."

And I am sick and tired for New York taking the blame in this country for the crime problem. You know, whenever you read a fact chart, it always says Detroit leads the world in rape and murder and everything else, but New York takes the blame. "New York's a cess pool. It's a cess pool of filth and crime. We're moving." Hey! I just moved here four years ago, and I'm not leaving, because this is the most exciting place in the world to live. Oh yeah! Yeah! There are so many ways to die in New York City, come on! Race riots, drive by shootings, subway crashes, construction cranes collapsing on the sidewalks, manhole covers blowing up, asbestos shooting into the sky. We had a subway crash here a couple of years ago. Five people died. The next day they found the driver was drunk and hooked on crack. Folks, this makes Disneyland look like a fucking bike ride, doesn't it? "Your driver today is Edward. He's drunk and hooked on crack. The man sitting next to you has a loaded nine-millimeter. Good luck, folks!" "Honey, get the camera out! This is gonna be fucking great!"

Yeah, I love living in New York, man, and people who live in New York, we wear that fact like a badge right on our sleeve because we know that fact impresses everybody! "I was in Vietnam." "So what? I live in New York!" "Really?" Yeah, because New York teaches you to live life the way it should be lived. Moment to moment. Yes!

(music begins in background)

Because every moment in New York could be your last. Oh yeah, yeah. You... could be walking down the street tomorrow, feeling good about yourself, drink free, drug free, looking forward to the future and somebody accidently nudges their poodle off of a 75th floor ledge. Doink! And he's headed for the ground at a hundred and seventy five thousand miles per hour. (howling) And cur-chunk! He's impeded in your head! You're dead on contact. The headline in the Post the next day reads, "Man killed by best friend." People cut the article out and they laugh about it at the office and you're forever remembered as the poodle man! "I knew the poodle man and he hated fucking poodles."

New York teaches you to live life moment to moment and street by street and beat to beat. Because we've all played that street to street game in New York, haven't we? Yes, we have. Good block. Bad block. Ooooh. Good block. Bad block. Oooo-Ooooh. Gun block. Crack block. Oooo-Ooooh. Asbestos block. Poodle block! Poodle block!

Because most people think, "Life sucks, and then you die." I disagree. I think life sucks, then you get cancer. Then you go into chemotherapy. You lose all your hair, you feel bad about yourself. Then all of the sudden the cancer goes into remission. You look good you feel good, you're going great, and all of the sudden you have a stroke. You can't move your right side. And one day you step off the curb at 68th by Lincoln Center and BANG! You get hit by a bus and then, maybe, you die.

Because I think Jim Henson said it best when he said, "Anybody got any aspirin? I think I got a cold." And a chill filled the room. We all have this incredible attachment to the Muppets, don't we? "We love the Muppets! They're so cute!" Did you hear about Jim Henson's funeral? Here in New York City, huh? Kermit the Frog and Big Bird sang "It's Not Easy Being Green" at Jim Henson's funeral. If I'm fifty-six years old when I kick the bucket and a fucking sock is singing at my funeral, I'm gonna pop out of the coffin and go, "Hey! What the hell is this about? Sammy Davis Jr. gets Frank Sinatra, and I get a fucking sock!? I'm pissed off now!"