denise nickerson, rip

Denise Nickerson, who died today, isn't exactly a household name. As near as I can tell from IMDB, she quit active a little over 40 years ago, and she was never a huge star. But she was involved in three distinct projects that I associate with my childhood and teen years, so her passing kind of reminds me that I'm aging.

Nickerson was, of course, involved in other projects. Notably, she was in Dark Shadows and she made a guest appearance on The Brady Bunch. But here I'm sticking with the three things that made her matter to me more than she should have.

By the way, Nickerson was only 62. Rest in peace.

Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory

Nickerson's role in Willy Wonka is probably her best known, so I'll start with that. When I was younger, I liked the movie. But it is a deeply flawed film -- especially if you judge it by 2019 standards, which isn't fair. But the movie is very judgemental and mean, and there are racist elements to it. Given the horror elements, I find it amazing that it was marketed as a kids film and got a G rating. Still, I have a certain warm place in my heart for it. And, since Nickerson is the subject of this post, I should note than she was very good in her role.

Zero to Sixty

Judging from IMDB, Zero to Sixty was Nickerson's last acting gig before she quit show business. It's a crappy little movie (crappy, but entertaining) about a teenage girl and a fifty-something man who work together to repossess cars.

I remember it vividly because of one visit to Florida. I don't know how old I was, but my family visited my grandparents in Florida. My grandparents had cable TV which was still a novelty -- at home we had fewer than ten working channels. Zero to Sixty was playing on cable, and my father and I watched it over and over and over during that visit.

Years later, he would still reference the movie by shouting "Repo!" in imitation of Denise Nickerson's character, Larry. And, without fail, if I brought up the (much less charming Repo Man), my father would confuse it for Zero to Sixty and start shouting "Repo!"

Zero to Sixty had a much better cast than one would expect. In addition to Denise Nickerson, there were Darren McGavin, Joan Collins, and other big names. But Nickerson held her own with these older, more seasoned stars.

Yeah, it was a crappy movie. But I remember it fondly.

The Electric Company

The Electric Company, which I also remember fondly, featured a group of teenagers (dubbed the Short Circus), of which Nickerson was one. The Electric Company was very popular among children of my cohort -- kids who had graduated from Sesame Street. One of my favorite bits was Fargo North, Decoder. The above is one segment.

bill buckner, rip

Bill Buckner has passed away.

Having grown up a Mets fan, I remember Buckner very clearly. He was the central figure (or at least a central figure) in one of the iconic moments in Mets history.

It's actually quite a shame that this is the moment that Buckner is remembered for. He was a very good baseball player -- one notch below Hall of Fame caliber. And yet he is remembered for one error in a crucial moment. Worse, popular mythology has made that moment out to be bigger than it was.

First, the game was tied when the play occurred. This was after the Mets had staged an unlikely comeback and scored two runs off the Sox -- which was in no way Buckner's fault. So even if Buckner had fielded the ball cleanly and made the play (which wasn't a sure thing, given Mookie Wilson's speed), ot would have meant the game continued into an 11th inning. Second, it was Game 6. So the Red Sox still had to lose another game in order to blow the World Series. Yes, that play was costly, but it was only one of many things that cost the Sox the Series. The loss was a team effort.

Anyway, RIP Bill Buckner.

my colleague, steve: rip

Yesterday I found out that a colleague, Steve, had passed away the day before.

Steve was older than me by a few years -- exactly how many, I don't know. Some characterized his age as "60-ish," but I think he was younger than that. Either way, it's too young to die. I didn't know he was sick, though apparently he had been out on short-term disability for some time. Of course, in an environment where many people work from home half the time (or more), it's easy to not notice someone missing -- especially if your work and his rarely connect.

Occasionally at work there'll be spome function where people have to say how long they've been at the company. Sometimes, when someone reveals a tenure that would be considered long in most contexts (e.g., 20 years), I may smirk and say something like "newbie" in a faux-mocking tone. Steve was one of the ones who could call me a newbie.

In my first rotation as a fresh-faced actuarial student, I was in the unit that administered actuarial functions related to our defined benefit business. One task that I had to perform on occasion involved researching participants' transaction histories. These histories determined what benefits they were entitled to. This many years later, I don't remember the details, so I can't explain it better than that. At any rate, I had to go to microfiche files, look up their transactions, copy them down and then perform some calculations in order to determine what category they belonged to. It was a very tedious process and I hated it. Steve usually had the task of checking my work.

On one occasion I took a shortcut. After getting part of a person's history I was able to determine what category he would be in. I could prove mathematically that he couldn't possibly be in any of the other categories. So I stopped searching through the records, wrote up my results and handed it to Steve. He asked about the rest of the transactions. I pointed out that they didn't matter -- no matter what else I would find, the category wouldn't change. He was clearly amused, but he explained to me that the work could get audited, and the auditors would want a complete transactional history. A proof based on a partial history wouldn't cut it even if it was right. That was when I realized that I had left the world of mathematicians.

I never forgot that lesson that Steve taught me, and the patient way he taught it to me.

Rest easy, Steve.