Posts by Kyle Matthews

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  • Busytown: Sons for the Return Home,

    What did you make of Virginia Larson’s editorial in the latest North and South?

    I can't recall the last time I've picked up north and south - it not being freely available online and all that. Should I?

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • Hard News: LATE OCTOBER: Life in the…,

    <q>Can I play Suzanne Vega yet? This song has always been a favourite of mine, out on the fringes.

    She wrote songs with lots of interesting topics. Luka is about child abuse, but this was always one of my favourites, about peace:

    (I find myself singing this song after breaking up or being broken up with by now-exs).

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • Speaker: Party Central, structures and silos,

    ETA: OK, temper that to "no lasting legacy for sports". It seems like it has stimulated a lot of local developments at least, which is pretty cool.

    I think there will always be argument over the money, but I'm building a strong impression that the new Dunedin stadium has kicked pretty much everyone else's butts in terms of "stuff we did to get ready for the world cup". Take note Auckland - it's quite close to the waterfront (though not in a particularly useable area for social activities), and people like the view of it, despite it being in the way.

    I'm not going to any world cup games, but I saw Otago play Manawatu in it. Fantastic.

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • Busytown: Sons for the Return Home,

    As for schools not being overly enthusiastic about adopting the standards, the one our three go to in Sandringham is holding out pretty well. But, there is news of considerable pressure being applied to recalcitrant schools. There does seem to be a number of principals willing to stretch the limits of the offside line to the maximum though.

    You can sense that there's a battle going on quietly between about 20% of schools who have decided that this is worth dying in a ditch over, and the Ministry/Minister, which is just sometimes spilling out into the public sphere.

    My impression is that they're all being crushed slowly.

    I expect that James Butler’s guess that Pacific nations might be right up there is right, just as a numbers game.

    Samoa, Niue would be well up above 15% in NZ, let alone overseas. Half at least?

    We spend a high proportion on students (allowances, interest free loans), at the cost of institutional support.

    Actually we spend quite low on both. And as a university staff member, students have been helping fund my reasonable pay increases for a few years now.

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • Cracker: Island Time,

    Small matter of a baby in the next month or so, but once that's sorted...

    Normally people wait until they're up at 3am, the baby has been crying for three hours, and they've got a 6.30am start before they start talking about 'sorting' the bloody thing.

    Good to plan ahead I guess?

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • Hard News: Towards the Truth,

    It was our producer's idea -- and he maintains he always knew Sir Bruce would says yes. But, well, we were a wee bit surprised ...

    I was surprised too. I bet the government and the upper echelons of NZ Defence were pissed that he agreed.

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • Field Theory: Four Years Ago,

    South Africa have 2 WC wins from 2 less tournaments than us, plus another loss in a final to go with the 03 quarterfinal exit. They’ve only ever lost two knockout games in 4 tournaments versus the ABs who have lost 5 knockout games in the last 5 tournaments.

    That’s not necessarily a useful analysis. Using that model, you might have two teams, one of which always got beaten at the quarter-final stage, and another which always lost the final. And you’d rate them the same as they’d both lost the same number of knockouts.


    Centre of Dunedin was well humming last night for the ABs game. Well set up with bars spewing onto the streets and no problems apart from trying to find a seat. Tonight hopefully will go well, there were crazy numbers of campervans driving into town yesterday. Go Argentina.

    Romania just played a fantastic game against Scotland – let in two late tries to mean they didn’t win, but gave it all with very limited speed. Scotland are going to have to be way better than that if they want to make the quarters.

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • OnPoint: Sock-Puppeting Big Tobacco to…,

    Having read through this thread, I think it's really lost the original point of Keith's post - what the hell are these tobacco companies trying to do?

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • Hard News: Everybody's News,

    “Dick Cheney stopped flying on commercial airlines before 9/11”, because he and GWB were incredibly unpopular at the time, to the point of his security finding it very difficult to operate in public.

    When was the last time that the VP ever flew on commercial airlines, apart from a publicity stunt? There's a couple of helicopters and some planes available for his use provided by the military.

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • Hard News: Complaint and culture,

    The item, as presented, is nonsense (proving that the distance is material to the item). Being cute doesn’t trump that.

    I think you're setting your sights a little high for the 6pm news bulletin. We're lucky they didn't try and live cross the 240 million light years.

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

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