Name: Dave Breaks New Year’s Resolutions | David Letterman
Uploaded: 2026-01-12T16:00:36.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Dave Breaks New Year’s Resolutions | David Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2026-01-12. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Dave Breaks New Year’s Resolutions | David Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2026-01-12. Transcript available.

Dave Breaks New Year’s Resolutions  | David Letterman

Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the program. I'm, uh,
thank you very much, ma'am.
A woman, for those of you who didn't hear that, and you probably didn't hear it
because I just
barely heard it, a woman from, I think, maybe somewhere in Wisconsin. Are you
from Wisconsin?
Is that you again, ma'am? Yes, I'm from Green Bay. Yeah, she's from Green Bay,
Wisconsin,
and we have notified security. So, uh, we, uh, we're just back here from a
vacation over the
holiday time. I had a, uh, I must say, I had a wonderful holiday. Of course,
there was,
I actually had some trouble a couple of weeks ago on the subway, but that's
pretty much blown over now.
So, uh, boy, oh boy, that took the heart right out of me. Well, so I'm at home.
I'm in California
watching, uh, Dick Clark's, what is the name of that show, Paul? He does every
New Year's Eve.
Oh, uh, Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve.
Wait, is it Rockin' New Year's Eve, or New Year's?
Isn't it New Year's Rockin' Eve, I think.
What is it?
Whatever. We'll send someone to the library to find out, but, uh, so I'm
sitting at home
there, uh, and it's about, uh, uh, 1130 coming up on midnight, and I'm watching
the show.
I'm sorry, ma'am?
Oh, I had a little cold.
Uh, just go sit with the lady from Green Bay, will ya?
Being interrogated by the...
What, what did you do New Year's Eve, ma'am?
I can't sit on TV.
Oh, no.
That was Times Square.
All right, well, that, uh, a good point. I was just getting to that.
So, uh, this concludes the audience participation portion of our show.
So, so, uh, I'm watching the show at home, and, uh, and, uh, Dick Clark, and by
the way,
isn't this man on too many shows, let's think about it for a second. There's,
of course,
Bandstand. We'll give him Bandstand. He can do Bandstand till the day he stops
breathing.
That's fine. Which I think may have been a few years ago, but...
He can do Bandstand, but he's not, get him off the blooper deal. Get him off
the game show deal. He's on too many shows, don't you think?
How many shows? Four or five?
Who knows? He's got four or five shows on.
One show per person. That's it.
Um, so he's on the other one. The bloopers, the New Year's Eve show, the, uh,
on too many shows.
Pyramid.
That's right. We covered that, sir.
Um, so I'm watching, I'm watching the big gala, New Year's Eve celebration at
home in California. It's about 1130. We've been through all of this before.
And, uh, they put a little, uh, indicator there on the screen that says videotaped
earlier.
And, uh, I don't know about you, but this, this was really a relief to me
because I had visions of the producer of the show saying to the folks in Times
Square,
uh, okay, that was great, folks. Now, can you be back here about quarter or
three? We'll do one for California.
Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much.
We got a, uh, we got a good show to start the new year here, don't we? Stupendous.
Uh, from Van Halen, David Lee Roth is here.
And of course, whenever you have anybody on from Van Halen, you have to have
sex therapist, Dr. Ruth Westheimer.
Thank you, Jerry.
And, uh, we're going into the studio audience tonight to find out about, uh,
brushes with the law that members of our audience have had.
Oh, my, oh, my. Thank you very much, sir. Is there a, uh, Jerry D'Esposito in
the audience?
Hi, Jerry. How are you? Nice to see you. Where are you from, Jerry?
Bloomfield, New Jersey.
Bloomfield, New Jersey. What do you do for a living in Bloomfield?
Um, legal secretary.
Legal secretary, as opposed, of course, to the illegal secretary.
I bet you're sick of that joke, aren't you?
Yeah.
Uh, and, uh, you, now, you're going to tell us about something, an experience
in your past life you've had where you ran afoul of the law, correct?
Yeah.
All right, Jerry, go right ahead.
Okay.
Did you have a good New Year, first of all?
Oh, yes.
Good. What did you do?
Went to a party.
Yeah. Was it a nice party?
Yes.
No fistfights?
No fistfights.
Well, that's good. All right, Jerry, go ahead.
Okay. Um, I was supposed to feed a cat from a next-door neighbor, and I went
over there, and the lady next door to her thought I was a prowler.
So she called the police on me, and when they came over, there was a big commotion.
There was a lot of, uh, sinister.
Gunplay?
Well, sort of. Sort of. A lot of handcuffing.
Handcuffing?
Yeah.
No kidding.
Yeah, and I got really upset, and I cried, so I called my father up, uh, next
door, and he told me that he couldn't talk to me because there was something
going on next door, and he hung up.
Oh, he doesn't realize that you're next door?
Yeah, he didn't know I was there.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
So, I think we have a movie of the week here with Karen Valentine.
Kind of, this thing figured out.
So.
How old were you at the time?
I was 17.
Mm-hmm.
I was 17.
I was really afraid.
I was crying, so I finally.
Were the police nasty to you?
Yes.
Oh, they can do that.
They were very nasty.
They were very, yeah, very businesslike.
Yeah.
So as they were pulling me out the front door, my father was there, and I
pointed out to him, you've got to come up here, and he was really, he was
shocked to see it was me.
So we got it all straightened out.
And you ended up doing time.
No, no.
But you were frightened and miserably scared, weren't you?
Yes, I was.
Now, did you learn anything from this?
We always like to find out if the person has learned something.
Yes, I'm always going to tell my parents if I go anywhere.
Good idea.
And do you still do that to this day?
No.
No.
Jerry, we have something for you.
What do we have for you, Bill?
Oh, the sponge and the cup, Dave.
We're giving them both away?
The late night drinking your cup and the sponge.
Thank you, Jerry.
Nice meeting you.
Is there a Scott Krager with us this evening?
Hi, Scott.
Nice to see you.
Where are you from, Scott?
Maryland, Silver Spring.
Silver Springs, Maryland?
And you don't have a job, do you, Scott?
No, I'm kidding.
I'm a student.
I'm kidding.
I dropped your card.
And where do you go to school?
University of Maryland.
Now, don't you think I'm right about this?
Oh, you do, ma'am.
Why don't you have one of these little hats, then?
Don't you think I'm right about this Dick Clark deal?
Oh, yeah, definitely.
Well, what can we as citizens do?
I don't know, Dave.
I really don't know.
All right, Scott.
Tell me about your brush with the law.
Well, I was 16, and I was coming home from work.
What kind of job does a 16-year-old have?
Usual McDonald's type job.
What did you do for McDonald's?
Usual cooking fries, cooking hamburgers.
Did you like that kind of work?
No.
3.35 job.
Yeah, but plenty of food, right?
You get sick of it.
Yeah.
You get sick of it.
Well, the McDonald's folks would be happy to hear that, Scott.
What testimony from a former employee.
All right, now, so tell me about your brush with the law.
So, anyway, there was an X-rated drive-in movie theater, and I decided to sneak
in because
you have to be 18 to get in.
Sure, and you were 16.
I was 16.
So, I drive in through the exit, pull up, put the little...
That's a nice touch there.
I like that.
I put one of those little sound boxes in the window.
Everything's fine.
I'm watching the movie.
Guy comes up, asks for my ticket.
I said, I lost it, and it wasn't good enough for him.
Normally, that works anywhere you go, doesn't it?
So, he took me to the film room, and as we passed this police tow truck, so I
knew I was
in for it, so we're in there, and I'm trying to cry, you know, look upset, and
so he told
me the owner makes money from prosecuting people that sneak in, and he said
most people
jump the fence, but I drove my car through, so he said he towed my car, and it
would cost
$60.
So, he goes, you look like a smart guy.
Do you have any ideas?
So, I said, if that's how he makes his money, I'll be glad to pay, you know,
whatever he'd
make.
So, he goes, I'll tell you what, he makes $10 from prosecuting the kids, and he
said,
it's $5 to get in here, so you pay me $15.
Leave, don't ever come back, and don't tell your parents.
So, I left, didn't tell my parents, and they can never come back.
Wow.
You're lucky to be alive, too, aren't you?
Let me see what we have to stop.
All right, the same.
Let me get a sponge and a drinking cup.
My, oh my.
How are we doing?
Are we all right?
Is there a Suzanne Browson here?
Hi, Suzanne.
Nice to see you.
Hi.
How are you?
Nice to meet you.
Where are you from?
New Orleans, Louisiana.
You know, New Orleans is a wonderful city.
Yes, it is.
How long have you lived there?
12 years.
Yeah, and you like it quite well?
What do you do down there?
I own and operate a restaurant.
What kind of restaurant?
Sandwich shop, streetcar sandwiches.
Nice place?
Yes, very nice.
Good food?
Good food.
All right.
And what are you doing in New York?
Just on vacation.
Yeah.
I go back tomorrow.
All right.
Now, we're talking about brushes with the law.
Brushes with the law.
Yeah.
When I was 20 years old, I lived in Hawaii for the summer.
And I was...
How did you get to live in Hawaii for the summer?
Well, I just asked my parents if I could go, and I saved up the money and went.
Oh, so you had to save up the money?
Yeah, I had to save up the money.
Did you have to work for the money, or did the folks just give you the money?
No, I had to work for the money.
All right.
Well, I like that.
This sounds good.
My father liked that.
Yeah.
What does dad do for a living, by the way?
He's a vice president of an insurance company.
All right.
We'll overlook that.
All right.
So, now you're in Hawaii for the summer.
You're 20.
Mm-hmm.
And I'm on the beach in my bathing suit.
And I went by a luau table.
They have luau's outside on the beach.
And I stole a banana from a place setting at the luau.
And a policeman saw me, and I was about half a block down the beach.
And he made me come and put it back in front of everyone.
Oh, my God.
Oh, you poor thing.
She was really humiliating.
I don't know if you folks heard that, but she had to put it back, ladies and
gentlemen.
Oh, my God.
Suzanne, well, I hope you learned something from that ugly ordeal.
I really did.
I really did.
I'm never done so.
There you are.
Nice meeting you.
I can't get that out of my mind.
They made her put it back.
Category top ten ways to prepare for a winter storm.
This is the way it was in the old days, Paul.
When you were a kid, when I was a kid, you'd get them lined up one after
another.
Like a storm, yeah.
You'd get snow.
It'd be cold.
You didn't like the cold.
Lined up like at LaGuardia.
Yeah.
One after another.
You hate the cold because of it.
Yeah.
You have memories of being cold.
Oh, I was traumatized.
Dark and cold in Thunder Bay.
Unusually so.
It was a wet cold up there, too, wasn't it?
It's the worst.
It's coming right off Lake Superior.
That's right.
Yeah, nothing worse.
So, the top ten ways to prepare for a winter storm.
And if you don't know by now, then you're screwed.
We've had so many.
And there's another one coming.
The Weather Channel says, get ready.
And like I said, Jim Cantore said, we probably won't be above freezing until
Labor Day.
Labor Day.
Jim Cantore.
Labor Day.
Labor Day.
Okay, ways to prepare for a winter storm.
Ten, if you must go outside, bring an electric blanket.
Number nine, call 911.
Warn them, you may need them later.
Number eight, visit elderly neighbors' apartments for free heat.
Number seven, put video camera in window to record pedestrians slipping on ice.
That's just plain mean.
Number six, buy a box of diapers or two boxes if you have kids.
Number five, we have a tie.
De-ice the defroster or defrost the de-icer.
Number four, post a man-seeking body warmth.
Add on Craigslist.
Number three, rank your pets by most edible.
Number two, remind a wife to shovel with her legs, not with her back.
And the number one way to prepare for a winter storm, keep seven days of
medication on hand
and a month of weed.
There you go.
Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, we're playing a little something calle