Personal
1960: Born at Swedish hospital. I’m a month early and weigh less than 5 pounds.
1961: According to family lore I spend most of the year crying.
1962: Make Grandma Thora promise that she’ll never get old. She promises.
1963: John F. Kennedy dies.
1964: After winning the sack race at my own birthday party, am told that it isn’t polite for the birthday girl to claim the prize. I cry and pout and am sent to my room.
1965: Get caught drawing pictures of naked people.
1966: My dad and his best friend build an A-frame cabin on Whidbey Island. Spend a decade of idyllic summers on the shores of Useless Bay.
1967: Lay on a skateboard as I travel down a hill, dragging the toes of my saddle shoes because I hate them. Get in lots of trouble but it’s worth it because my replacement shoes are adorable red t-straps. Big sister Anne never gets over the unfairness.
1968: My straight-laced banker father brings home the Beatles’ White Album because his secretary Charlotte (who wore miniskirts) tells him he has to. We blast the record on our wall-mounted hi-fi and dance around the house all night.
1969: Move from Kirkland to Magnolia. Flunk weekly multiplication test until I realize, after weeks of post-dinner flashcard practice with Mom, that 3 x 5 means three fives or five threes! Regardless, math is dead to me.
1970: Steal carton of cigarettes from my mom. She doesn’t notice.
1971: Lock Linda Fry in our garage. She cries and I get grounded for a month and miss Halloween. Still blame Linda Fry.
1972: Find an unopened bottle of MD 20/20. And by “find” I mean “stole” from Albertsons.
1973: 7th grade, Blaine Junior High School. Smoke pot. Inhale.
1974: Greet my Mother’s cheery “good morning” with a monotone grunt and silent inner rage.
1975: As part of a student comedy group performing short sketches in the annual Junior High talent show, I get big laughs. Feels good. Also decide not to be a drunken stoner.
1976: My best friend Paulette moves to Arizona. Devastated.
1977: Try out for cheerleading and, even though I mentally blackout during my solo cheer and end up randomly kicking and twirling for two minutes, I make the squad.
1978: Graduate from Queen Anne High School with a good grade point and bad study habits. Enter the University of Washington that fall.
1979: First thing I learn in college is to never take classes immediately following lunch because it’s impossible to stay awake on a full stomach. I later learn to not take afternoon classes in spring quarter because they interfere with my laying-in-the-sun time.
1980: Fall in love with my geology class TA and, even though I hate to camp, sign up for the weekend trip to Mount Saint Helens because he is leading. Mountain blows up five weeks later.
1981: Sign up to ride a bike across America to raise money to end world hunger. Back out when I remember that I hate biking and realize that the organizing group is a cult.
1982: Graduate from the University of Washington with a degree in the mysterious field of Speech Communications. Job offers? None.
1983: Depressed for most of the year.
1984: Sign up for an introduction to acting class at Seattle Central Community College. Changes my life.
1985: Meet Joe Guppy. Changes my life.
1986: Take a 6-week backpacking dream vacation to Europe with a good friend. Ruin it by pining after Joe the entire time.
1987: Join the staff of KING TV’s late night comedy show “Almost Live!.” Oh yeah, I also marry Joe.
1988: Realize that Joe is not an extension of me. Irritating.
1989: Move to Los Angeles to write for HBO’s “Not Necessarily The News.” Get canned after 13 weeks.
1990: Work on numerous TV shows. All but one suck.
1991: Write jokes for Tony Danza. Get Danny Baldwin fired. See Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman in an elevator.
1992: Following a minor mental breakdown, move back to Seattle and re-join the cast of “Almost Live!” Joe and I separate.
1993: A blur of individual therapy and couples counseling. Joe and I reunite and celebrate our fragile reconciliation by buying a house.
1994: While shooting a sketch for “Almost Live!” on Aurora Avenue, three separate drivers pull over, thinking I’m a prostitute.
1995: Get a 15-month old black poodle named Bebo. He is the light of our childless life and a total neurotic.
1996: Hire a director and six actors for “Cheaper Than Therapy,” a live show of my sketches, that runs for 6 weeks at the Market Theatre. Remarkably, I make a little money.
1997: Participate in three rear-enders, all my fault, in under a month. Insurance rate soars.
1998: Lose Joe’s wonderful older brother Ed and our dear friend Rachel.
1999: “Almost Live!” is cancelled. An amazing era comes to a close but lives on in early morning reruns.
2000: Hired to host an environmental show called “The Salmon Exchange.” Learn a whole lot about salmon.
2001: Find and buy a fixer-upper and move in with Joe’s parents while we remodel what is clearly going to be our dream home.
2002: Move into our dream home and realize it’s not dreamy enough. Joe feels frustrated with my “inability to be satisfied.”
2003: Hired by KMPS radio morning show “Ichabod Caine & The Waking Crew” to engage in witty banter and do traffic reports. Also, Grandma Thora breaks her promise by getting old and dying.
2004: Borrow $3000 from my Dad to make the pilot episode of “City a Go Go,” a 5-minute weekly TV show about the local art scene.
2005: The “Almost Live!” cast reunites for a reunion show. Bob Nelson still the nicest cast member.
2006: Sell our “not-dreamy-enough” house just before the market tanks and move into a condo where I immediately exclaim, “This is perfect and I totally swear that I’ll never want to move again!” Joe stares blankly and turns away.
2007: Bebo dies. Joe begins to write his memoir that will take, according to him, “about a year.”
2008: Launch “Art Zone with Nancy Guppy,” a weekly half-hour local arts show on Seattle Channel 21. Joe still writing his memoir.
2009: Yank a huge hunk of slimy hair out of the shower drain, take a picture of it, and post it on Facebook—575 likes! Joe still writing his memoir.
2010: Turn 50. Spend $900 on tight black leather pants. Joe still writing his memoir.
2011: My new short bangs cause way too many people to exclaim; “Wow, those bangs sure make you look younger!” Joe still writing his memoir.
2012: Celebrate 25 years of marital bliss. Arrive at the opening night of the Seattle International Film Festival in a dog crate. Joe still writing his memoir.
2013: Discover planking and the joyful power of prune juice. Joe still writing his fucking memoir.
2014: Good news: my itchy skin condition turns out not to be Leprosy! Plus, Joe’s memoir is published to critical acclaim.
2015: Produce “MUSICIAN: A Portrait Project,” a large scale exhibit of photography by Ernie Sapiro. May be the coolest thing I’ve ever worked on.
2016: Discover RevitaLash, the miraculous beauty product that stops eyelashes from naturally shedding resulting in an exotic Cleopatra look with no dangerous side effects. That they know of.
2017: Thrilled to interview Art Garfunkel in front of a live audience on the Neptune Theatre stage until I realize that he’s a narcissistic jackass.
2018: Open my first ever visual art show, “The Further Adventures of Snippity Snap,” at Solo Bar & Gallery. People buy stuff.
2019: Agree to a month-long house/cat-sitting gig without seeing the house or the cat. Becomes clear within five minutes of meeting “Momo” that this decision was a cataclysmic error in judgement.
2020: Scale down "Art Zone with Nancy Guppy” into the COVID-friendly format, “AZ Phones It In,” and eat homemade peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for lunch 73 days in a row.
2021: Discover that the “shareable” size bag of Peanut M&M’s is just enough for me. Also discover that—as Joe recovered from knee surgery—Florence Nightingale I am not.
2022: Officiate the wedding of beloved nephew Nick to the beautiful Jenny. Also, keep freezer stocked with slices of homemade cake, thickly frosted, for nightly consumption. Share begrudgingly.
2023: Realize, at age 63, that I don’t run the world! Also learn first hand that staying hydrated is essential to staying alive.
2024: Of these 365 days, the most important day, the best day, is the birth of my grand niece, Ellie Anne Economou. She is beautiful, adorable, and holding her tiny, less-than-one-year-old self in my arms is sheer delight! She seems to like me… so far.
2025: In this year of navigating seismic changes in my personal life— I’ll tell you all about it next time we have coffee— the thrilling bookend is the arrival of my second grand niece, Cora Beverly Baumingham. Nothing like a darling infant to snap into focus what matters in this life.
Professional
2008—Present: Writer, Host, Senior Producer, Co-Creator; “Art Zone with Nancy Guppy.” The Seattle Channel.
2022: Receive the Silver Circle Award from NATAS / National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.
2020: Writer, Host, Senior Producer “Art Zone Phones It In.” The Seattle Channel.
2016—2019: Writer; “Coffee with Guppy,” interview column. Seattle Business Magazine.
2007: Producer; “Verve,” artist profile show. The Seattle Channel.
2004: Writer, Host, Creator; “City A Go Go,” arts show. The Seattle Channel & KCTS-TV.
2003—2005: Writer, On-Air Talent; “Ichabod Caine & the Waking Crew.” KMPS radio.
2000: Host; “Salmon Exchange.” University of Washington TV.
1997: Writer, Producer; “KCTS Currents,” interstitial arts segments. KCTS-TV.
1996: Writer, On-Air Host; KONG-TV.
1992—1993: Staff Writer, Cast Member; “Almost Live.” Comedy Central.
1992—1999: Staff Writer, Cast Member; “Almost Live.” KING-TV.
1991: Writer; “Julie,” sitcom starring Julie Andrews, directed by Blake Edwards. ABC.
1990: Writer; “Haywire,” sketch comedy show, Kevin Bright, executive producer. FOX TV.
1990: Writer; “My Talk Show.” Imagine Entertainment for Fox TV.
1989: Writer; “Disneyland’s 35th Anniversary Show,” directed by John Landis. NBC.
1989: Staff Writer; “Not Necessarily the News.” HBO.
1988—1989: Staff Writer, Cast Member; “Almost Live.” KING-TV.
1986: Freelance Actor; “Almost Live.” KING-TV.
Nancy Guppy won a Writers Guild Award for “Not Necessarily The News” on HBO and multiple Northwest Regional Emmy Awards as host, writer, producer, and cast member for “Almost Live” on KING-TV and “Art Zone with Nancy Guppy” on Seattle Channel 21.