Jay Kersting's Blog

First things first, a little housekeeping.  Things that I have been meaning to write about but haven't gotten too.

I want to tell everyone about a very enjoyable book that I am reading.  "Hep Remembered" is about the late football coach of the Indiana Hoosiers.  Terry Hoeppner died in June of brain cancer and served as the inspiration of the Hoosiers team this season.  At first thought, many will think "Indiana....football....huh??" but there is so much more to Coach Hoeppner.  While Indiana is not thought of as being a traditional football power, Coach Hoeppner reignited the players, the staff and even some of the fans who had been suffering with a program that hasn't made a major bowl game appearance since the 1967 Rose Bowl.  Sadly, Hep passed before his impact at Indiana could be fully appreciated. 

If Indiana becomes a more respectable program in the next few years, they did make a bowl appearance this past season, you can give credit to Hep for getting things rolling in Bloomington.  I have not finished the book yet, but it has some great anecdotes throughout.  I plan on finishing in on the planes as we head out west for vacation.  

Big Thank You to Roger Thompson for this great gift.  Roger, while not an Indiana fan, I will be pulling for them to keep winning under Coach Lynch and build that legacy that Hep deserves.

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Dave Foulk asked that I write about this, so here goes.  He called it one of the oddest moments in radio.

As many of you know, I was the traffic reporter on WNOX in Knoxville for about 4 and a half years.  What you may not know is that I held that same position on WNOX's sister stations.  Along the way, one of those stations was hip-hop/rap Wild 98.7 (WYIL).

After starting out as simply "J.K." for a few months, I was approached to make a change.

What kind of change is the traffic guy supposed to make?  

Soon, I found out.  The new program director and the operations manager approached me.  They had heard me do different voices around the studios.  Hell, everyone in radio does this.  I may have gone a step further since I actually took a class taught by Don Messick back in 1993.  

"Jay, we need to take this to the next level."

What in the Hell does that mean?  I was the damned traffic guy.  Next level?  What, they want me to build a fancy interchange?  What in the Hell does THAT mean? 

Well, after demonstrating some of the voices that I do well, they wanted something different.  So, went with one that I could do rather easily.....a very bad version of Homer Simpson.  And we named him "Highway Homie" to go along with all of the other homeys there in K-Town.

So for about eight months, I not only did the WNOX traffic gig as ME, I did the WOKI (AAA) traffic gig as me....and then I switched gears and became "Highway Homie" on Wild 98.7 twice an hour.  

Well, I figured if I had to do something this damned ridiculous with my voice, I may as well give Homie a personality to match.  Yeah, I gave him Homer Simpson's personality as well.  Punctuated a lot of things with "D'oh!" and "mmmmmm" through the reports.  

One time there was an overturned tractor-trailer on Middlebrook Pike at 44th Street.  Homie's report was something like this.  "Got an overturned truck on Middlebrook at 44th....GOOD NEWS, not a Beer Truck.  Mmmmm...beer....  Lots of police officers here to get this cleaned up.  Maybe I should share my doughnuts." 

Now here is the bad part.  Kathy would have people ask her at work what happened to "J.K." on Wild and who was "Highway Homie" and why he replaced me.  She was quite embarassed to admit that I was "Highway Homie"....probably embarassed to admit that SHE was married to Homie. 

Well, this went on for eight months.  It ended when the station was flipped to a new format. 

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Congratulations to my nephew Jamie Henne who is a new daddy!!  Brayden Henne joined us yesterday morning at 7 pounds 8 ounces and 20.5 inches tall/long.  Mom and Brayden are doing great.  I am sure that Dad is in panic mode.  New Dad... it happens. 

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Stick a fork in her, she's done!!

Well, maybe not.  But the momentum is against Hillary Clinton.  Things are moving quite well for Barack Obama, having won 8 of the last 8 primaries/caucuses.

But there is this little issue of the Super Delegates.  Aren't they just Super?  Well, depends on who is your candidate in the Democrat race.  

First a little history, the first use of the Superdelegates came in the 1984 election.  Superdelegates are uncommitted delegates that come from the ranks of Democrat elected officials.  In 1984, it was the Superdelegates who handed the nomination to Walter Mondale over Gary Hart. Some have done some historical revisionism to state that this was done to hurt Jesse Jackson.  Not true as he was not one of the two leaders.  BUT it has been brought up to stir race in to the mix again this year.  Unfair to Senator Obama.

The Superdelegate was created to help steer the nomination in line with how the votes were cast during primary/caucus process.  Since lobbying for these votes is part of the process now, it sort of removes this movement toward reflecting the will of the voters.

Oh well, we will see.  It is THEIR process.  Not mine.  Same goes for the GOP.  Their process.  Not mine.

Thank GOD!!

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Comment and click away!!  Especially on those political ads.  Ha ha ha....