Fluffmeister and proud of it

By now a zillion words have splattered on the web about Dick Clark's death at 82 from a heart attack. I don't have much to add, beyond the obvious fact that the guy was really, really good at what he did.

You may not think that what he did was very important, and you may be right. Clark himself had no illusions. He commented about one of his productions: "There's no redeeming cultural value whatsoever to Bloopers, but it's been on for 20 years. It's a piece of fluff. I’ve been a fluffmeister for a long time."

His game show resume, of course, begins with Pyramid, one of the genre's classics by any standard. It's almost intimidating to watch him on the show because he was so flawless. Even when he screwed up, he recovered brilliantly. Sometimes I thought he intentionally screwed up once in a while just to make himself look a little more human.

Clark was a terrific businessman as well, as most everybody has noted. He made no bones about his liking for the finer things in life, and he was very good at getting them. In his later years he battled back courageously after a crippling stroke and earned some grudging respect from even his harshest detractors. R.I.P.