Archive for December 2nd, 2008

In case you’re wondering…

The more observant amongst you will have probably noticed that every time I post a poll, a stray “n” appears just above it. Annoyingly, it’s not possible for me to remove this without manually editing the database which runs this site.

As it turns out, it’s a bug (as I suspected) in the Democracy plugin which runs the polls. I just didn’t connect the dots between that and me upgrading this blog to WordPress version 2.5.x a while back.

In lieu of a patch from the developer, it looks like the fix is fairly straight-forward. I’ll try it out at some stage in the coming days and see how it goes.

Samuel

December 2nd, 2008 at 02:24pm

Vale Paul Hardy

Paul HardyRadioinfo is reporting that Paul ‘Cracker’ Hardy, the voice of the Harvey Norman commercials amongst other things, has died due to a heart attack aged 57.

Update: Paul apparently passed away on Sunday night. Morning host on American music radio station 95.3FM WAOR, Tommie Lee, has written a short tribute to Paul on his blog. End Update

Further Update: I’ve had a look through my collection of ads and found a few of Paul’s voiceovers…unfortunately I can’t find any of his Rebel Sport ads, although it’s quite probable that I have some at home in an un-catalogued file somewhere. Anyway, here’s a sample of some of the ads of his that I have in my collection, plus his demo from his production company Hardy Audio.

[audio:https://samuelgordonstewart.com/wp-content/PaulHardy.mp3]
Download MP3

Some of the non-Harvey Norman ads make me realise just how prolific Paul’s voice really is in Australian media…to think that his subtle voice changes made me think I was listening to a different person.

Thanks to Frankster for contributing a couple of these ads to my collection a while back (around the time of the Harvey Norman theme music change if I recall correctly) and to Jock’s Journal for the photo of Paul. Jock’s Journal have a tributes page at http://newmedia.com.au/Paul_Hardy.htm.
End Update

Samuel

3 comments December 2nd, 2008 at 01:51pm

Samuel’s Blog Weekly Poll: Westpac and St. George Bank Merging

It’s all done and dusted, and I can even use Westpac ATMs without being charged an “other bank ATM” fee which saves me from navigating the maze of construction works in Cooleman Court, but I’m still not entirely sure what to make of the merger between Westpac Bank and St. George Bank. So, I’ll ask you:

Is Westpac Bank’s purchase of St. George Bank…?

Total Votes: 42
Started: December 2, 2008

The results from last week’s poll were fairly split:

After a year of the Kevin Rudd Labor government, how do you rate their performance?

Total Votes: 26
Started: November 22, 2008

That said, if we treat “OK” as a neutral answer, then we have 16 people satisfied with the Rudd Government’s performance, and eight people unsatisfied. A 67%-33% split is pretty good in my books.

Davky also noted in the comments on last week’s poll that, for a first term government, they’re doing well on the “unity” front. I’d agree with that, although I probably do err on the side of “OK-Bad, but no worse than anyone else”, and I think I voted for the latter.

Results from previous polls can be viewed at https://samuelgordonstewart.com/weekly-poll-results.

Samuel

December 2nd, 2008 at 11:19am

Deniliquin — It’s about six and a half hours drive from Canberra

There’s a headline which proves that I should not be the director of tourism and marketing for the Deniliquin Council!

I was going to wait until about 9am to post this, but seeing as I just told John Kerr and half the country about it…I’ll be spending the week in Deniliquin, starting at some stage, probably around midday on Sunday the 14th of December, (unless I decide to leave Canberra on the Saturday instead…assuming that the hotel have a vacancy for another night) and working at 2QN and Classic Rock FM filling in for newsreader Graham Munson from Monday to Friday.

Google Maps thinks it will take between 6.5 and 7 hours to drive there, depending on whether I go through Albury or Narrandera, although it does tend to overestimate the travel time for such trips. That said, with a couple stops along the way, it could be very accurate.

It should be a good week, and I’m certainly looking forward to it. The only downside that I can see to this is that I will have to miss out on a Christmas party on that Sunday, and I won’t be in town to panel the final Open House show of the year on 1WAY FM. I won’t have to miss the show entirely though as Vision, another station who take the show, have a repeater in Deniliquin. I suppose that blogging could be problematic during that week depending on what Internet access I have…suddenly I’m pleased that my laptop has a standard modem built-in, and Internode offer ten hours of complimentary dialup access per month with their ADSL plans. Such access would feel like I was waiting for somebody to send me a copy of the Internet on floppy disks via Australia Post, but it would be better than nothing.

Anyway, as I said, it should be a good week. I’m excited about it.

Samuel

3 comments December 2nd, 2008 at 03:20am

Aircheck Sunday Tuesday: 1WAY FM’s ACT Election Coverage

This week we’re heading back to the night of October 18 for 1WAY FM’s ACT Election updates. I was joined on the night by station manager Tim Malone who spent some of the night in the tally room, and by Kenneth Webb who was providing a bit more depth to the story behind the numbers. I also chatted with Kingsley Bruce, host of the Saturday night show “All That Jazz and Blues” a few times during the night, as the election updates were occurring during his show.

The coverage was going to start at 7pm, however when it became apparent shortly after 6pm that the electronically lodged votes were being counted by the electoral commission’s computers quite rapidly, we decided to start the coverage early.

You’re going to need a while for this one if you intend on listening to the whole thing. It might as well be an episode of Samuel’s Persiflage as it runs for an hour and twenty minutes.

[audio:https://samuelgordonstewart.com/wp-content/AircheckSunday/1WAYFMElection20081018.mp3]
Download MP3

Copyright notice: Copyright on this audio is jointly held by Samuel Gordon-Stewart, 1WAY FM, Tim Malone, Kenneth Webb and Kingsley Bruce. It is made available for personal use, and “fair use” as defined by copyright legislation only. This audio may not be redistributed without the prior written permission of a copyright holder.

Samuel

December 2nd, 2008 at 01:03am


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