#1 Norm vs. Love
#2 Norm Pimps Wiener Dog
#3 Artie Comes to Town
#4 Norm vs. Death
#5 Norm and Shelly in Love
#6 Laurie Runs for Office
#7 Norm and Shelly
#8 Gambling Man
#9 Norm vs. Norm
#10 Norm vs. Denby
#11 Norm vs. the Boxer
#12 Norm vs. Christmas
#13 Norm vs. the Evil Twin
#14 Norm vs. the Oldest Profession
#15 Norm vs. Jenny
#16 Norm vs. Fitz
#17 Norm vs. the Wedding
#18 Norm vs. Fear
#19 Retribution
#20 Laurie Loses It


Executive producer Bruce Rasmussen, Executive producer Rob Ulin, Executive producer Deborah Oppenheimer, Executive producer Bruce Helford

Co-executive producer Cheryl Holliday, Co-executive producer Dave Caplan, Producer Norm Macdonald, Producer Frank Sebastiano, Consulting producer Jerry Belson, Consulting producer Lloyd Garver, Produced by Al Lowenstein


#1 Norm vs. Love: Aired Wednesday, September 22, 1999

Norm tries to get a date with a new probabation officer named Shelly, and when she turns him down he tortures her English professor date. Norm hires ex-hooker Taylor to be the new receptionist without his boss's permission.

top
#2 Norm Pimps Wiener Dog: Aired Wednesday, September 29, 1999

Laurie won't let Newsweek publish her article because they want to publish a photo of her as well and she is very unphotogenic. Norm puts his dachshund out for stud to pay for a gift for Shelly's little brother to impress her, but her little brother sells the valuable baseball card and Weiner Dog stops performing after falling for Mr. Denby's miniature french poodle.

top
#3 Artie Comes to Town: Aired Wednesday, October 6, 1999

In this episode with the special Pokeman intro, Norm's half brother Artie makes a surprise visit. Shelly needs toys for orphans, and Artie offers them, but when Norm realizes that the toys are stolen, he stops Artie. Artie ends up pawning his Rolex to buy toys for the kids.

top
#4 Norm vs. Death: Aired Wednesday, October 13, 1999

When Danny's father dies, Norm has to face his fear of death and Danny has to face the fact that his father was gay.

top
#5 Norm and Shelly in Love: Aired Wednesday, October 20, 1999

Shelly kisses Norm, and then says she'll find him another probation officer so that they can date. When she discovers that Norm has been running a football pool at work, she gets upset, but they make up and give dating a try. Laurie signs up with a dating service. Guest starring Lou Rawls.

top
#6 Laurie Runs for Office: Aired Wednesday, October 27, 1999

Laurie meets Councilman Krantz and tries to pitch him an idea, but he is incredibly shallow and self-serving. With some urging from her office-mates, Laurie decides to run again him for the council seat, and Taylor mentions that she recognizes him from when she used to work as a prostitute. Norm and Artie decide to try to set Krantz up with a prostitute to further Laurie's campaign, but they get double-crossed by the hooker and end up making Laurie look like the bad guy. Norm and Shelly are actually having a relationship.

top
#7 Norm and Shelly: Aired Wednesday, November 3, 1999

Norm accidently tells Shelly that he loves her, and then gets scared when he thinks that she's looking for a more serious committment. He realizes that he really does want to make a committment to Shelly right when she decides to take a job in Colorado. Mr. Denby and Taylor continue helping Laurie in her campaign. Mr. Denby comes up with a whole new set of dirty tricks that backfire when Laurie's opponent dies.

top
#8 Gambling Man: Aired Wednesday, November 10, 1999

Laurie is running a group to help addicted gamblers, and is looking for one of the members named Steve who keeps not showing up. Norm, incredibly depressed about Shelly dumping him, agrees to help find Steve. He goes to Steve's and ends up getting sucked into a poker game. He falls easily back into his gambling addiction, stops coming to work, and Laurie feels guilty for sending him to Steve's in the first place. Laurie and Danny get Artie to tell them where Norm is, and the three of them manage to get arrested with Norm during a raid at the docks.

top
#9 Norm vs. Norm: Aired Wednesday, November 17, 1999

Taylor takes care of bailing Norm, Danny and Laurie out of jail, but she can't get the bondsman to cover Artie because he has outstanding parking tickets in New Jersey. Norm says he'll go get his money from his bookie and bail Artie out. Artie is scared to be in jail without his friends. Laurie goes with Norm to the bar to meet his bookie, because she doesn't trust him on his own. He gets his money, and tells his bookie he's never gambling again. Laurie has to go tend to her van being towed, so Norm waits for her in the bar. He sees a hockey goalie getting drunk who is supposed to be playing the Anaheim Ducks that night. The goalie tells Norm that he's being traded, and so he's going to let the Ducks win tonight. Norm can't stand it and bets all his winnings on the Ducks. Then the goalie passes out, so it turns out he won't be playing tonight. Norm is worried, but the Ducks manage to win anyway. He gets his money, and goes to bail Artie out. Artie has been beat up in jail. Norm realizes that if he hadn't made that final bet, he might have gotten Artie out in time to keep him from injury. Norm finally goes to gamblers anonymous, although he accidentally ends up in necrophiliacs anonymous. It's the end of Taylor's probationary period at the office, and she's worried that Mr. Denby is going to let her go. She gets him his favorite pastry, but Danny eats it. She tries to make nice with his wife, but ends up accidentally convincing her to leave Mr. Denby. Mr. Denby does hire Taylor on permanently, even though his wife has left him. He's depressed, so Taylor asks her to come to her celebratory dinner with her and Danny.

top
#10 Norm vs. Denby: Aired Wednesday, November 24, 1999

Norm and Mr. Denby bond over their breakups with the women in their lives. They go to the bar together, and decide that they'll each ask out a woman. Unfortunately, they ask out the same waitress, who decides to go out with both of them. They compete over her, until she decides that for her birthday she wants to sleep with both of them at the same time. They try to get each other to back down, and finally Norm backs out, but then Mr. Denby can't go through with sleeping with her, so Norm ends up getting the girl. An old high school acquaintance of Laurie's shows up because she's going on welfare. She accuses Laurie of calling her names in high school, and Laurie buys her crappy macrame clothing and hand bags out of guilt. Finally Laurie just writes her a check to alleviate her guilt.

top
#11 Norm vs. the Boxer: Aired Wednesday, December 1, 1999

Deep in debt, Norm finds a kid on the street who he thinks is a great boxer and persuades Danny to finance the training. Norm gets his bookie to check the kid out, and banking on the kid's future his bookie rips up his marker. Then Norm finds out that the kid is actually 27, and therefore it's no surprise that he looks so good in the ring with a bunch of teenagers. Norm gets the guy's wife to get him out of the boxing ring, and gives his bookie his car, his TV, and an organ to be named later to pay off his debt.

top
#12 Norm vs. Christmas: Aired Wednesday, December 15, 1999

Danny uses a secret Santa gift exchange to reveal his crush on Taylor. Norm tries to help Laurie get in the holiday spirit, but he ends up getting Artie shot when they break into Laurie's apartment to decorate.

top
#13 Norm vs. the Evil Twin: Aired Wednesday, January 5, 2000

Danny and Taylor go on their first date. Although Danny is incredibly nervous, he is also very gallant when one of Taylor's ex-Johns comes up and starts harassing her. She gives him a kiss goodnight. Laurie's twin sister Jamie comes to town, and when Laurie, in a moment of insecurity, tells Jamie that Norm is her boyfriend, Jamie immediately seduces Norm. Laurie finds out, and upset, but she and Norm end up having a very honest conversation about the fact that they have both wondered what it would be like to sleep with one-another. Although tension is in the air, they end up just playing Scrabble.

top
#14 Norm vs. the Oldest Profession: Aired Wednesday, January 19, 2000

Norm finds himself resorting to male prostitution to pay his rent. Danny is excited about his first date with Taylor. Laurie loses her eyebrows to some bogus mousturizer that Artie gives her.

top
#15 Norm vs. Jenny: Aired Wednesday, January 26, 2000

Laurie sets up Norm with her friend Jenny and although he originally didn't want to be setup, Norm is surprised when he and Jenny actually get along. Norm is horrified when Jenny's ex-boyfriend, a confident millionaire, proposes marriage to her. Danny and Taylor decide to take it slow due to her past profession, but she is so charmed by him that she can't keep her hands off him.

top
#16 Norm vs. Fitz: Aired Wednesday, February 9, 2000

Norm is trying to be friends with Jenny in order to get closer to her, and gives her bad advice on her relationship with her millionaire fiance, Fitz, to break them up. Fitz figures out what Norm is doing, and offers him a hockey coaching position in order to leave Jenny alone. Norm considers the option, but turns it down. Then Jenny finds out that she got into veterinarian school, which she's really excited about, but couldn't afford with out Fitz's money. Norm reconsiders telling her that he loves her, but Laurie busts out with the news anyway. Norm tells Jenny that yeah, he loves her, and yeah, he turned down getting back into hockey for her, but she should stay with Fitz. And they can't be friends anymore, 'cause it hurts too much. Jenny is blown away and then kisses him passionately.

top
#17 Norm vs. the Wedding: Aired Wednesday, February 16, 2000

Norm and Jenny wake up together the morning of her wedding. She has decided she is not going to marry Fitz, but her mother comes over to try to talk her out of this decision. Jenny says she's in love with Norm and he's marry her today if she asked him to. Her mother says to prove it, so Jenny asks Norm to marry her today and he hedges around a bit. Back with his buddies at the social services office, Norm says he definitely wants to marry Jenny someday, just not necessarily today. He finally decides he'll go through with it if that will make her happy, but when he sets up an inpromptu wedding at his apartment, he finds out that Jenny's mother leaned on her hard enough, and she decided to go through with the wedding to Fitz. He rushes to the church, with his friends close behind, and encounters Jenny's mother guarding the door. She tricks him into drinking a drink with Valium in it, and then locks him in a closet. He finally gets out of the closet, and burts into the church at the last minute. Jenny's mother maces him, but he continues staggering blindly down the aisle begging Jenny not to marry Fitz. Jenny realizes that she really does love Norm, and not Fitz, and takes off with the badly damaged Norm.

top
#18 Norm vs. Fear: Aired Wednesday, March 1, 2000

When Norm's back goes out, he refuses to go to the doctor even though he is in terrible pain. The rest of the gang agrees to each confront their greatest fear in order to convince Norm to confront his fear of doctors. Laurie confronts her father's dolls that he loved more than her, Artie pees in front of someone else, and Danny gives a speech in front of a large audience. So Norm finally goes to a crazy doctor who cures his back pain with a few well-placed twists and jabs.

top
#19 Retribution: Aired Wednesday, March 8, 2000

As revenge for Norm stealing Jenny, Fitz makes Norm's life miserable, putting his picture on child molestor posters, buying his building, and getting Jenny fired. To get him off his back, Norm stages a break-up with Jenny in front of Fitz that's almost for real when Jenny isn't properly informed of the plan.

top
#20 Laurie Loses It: Aired Wednesday, March 15, 2000

Laurie, after not winning social worker of the year yet again, feels unfulfilled by her job. She decides what she needs to do is work harder, but when she finds herself laughing at other people's problems, she realizes she needs something else. She goes to see her old mentor, who is suicidal herself, and realizes that what she really needs to do is get a life. Taylor is spending time with a very attractive male high school friend, and Danny is very insecure about it. After he questions her fidelity, she admits that she loves him, but then slams her door in his face. They eventually reconcile in their old cheerleader uniforms. Denby tries to make Norm's job as unpleasant as possible.

top