Samuel's Blog

Hard N Soft Bot – Strategy, Analysis, Hints and Tips

Today I take a look at results from a variety of strategies in the Hard N Soft Bot over the last eight days, provide some analysis on the ones that are working and the ones which can be improved, and provide a few hints and tips on ways to get the most out of the bot including my method of getting the bot to just bet on harness only for certain strategies.

Link to the Hard N Soft Bot

Samuel

Add comment March 20th, 2025 at 09:06pm

The Sunday Share: When the dog thinks the race is too short

Today was Canberra Cup Day for harness racing, and in between races they had a variety of fun events, one of which was dachshund races.

Naturally, for little dogs with little legs, the races were very short. In the first heat though, one of the dogs was not satisfied with this very short race and wanted to continue on, having seen the horses go right around the track, and managed to take people on quite a merry little chase.

Alas I didn’t see who won the final as the weather turned and I went home before the Canberra Cup and the final of the dachshund races. Still, it was good to see quite a decent crowd for the race meeting. Afternoon meetings are unusual for Canberra harness racing as they’re usually evening meetings, but if today is anything to go by, Sunday afternoons might be a good way to attract more crowds in future.

Samuel

Add comment March 16th, 2025 at 07:49pm

The Sunday Share: Music from the daughter of a star of The Bill

Last week I noted that the TV series The Bill is being officially released on YouTube and so this week it seems fitting to go off on a tangent from there.

One of the longest-serving actors on The Bill was Trudie Goodwin who played WPC (and later Sergeant) June Ackland. In the show right from the start and until only a few years before the end, Trudie was rightly seen as one of the main faces of The Bill and, unlike many other characters over the years who left quite suddenly, Trudie and her character June were honoured with a long parting storyline which culminated in the brief return of Mark Wingett as Jim Carver, alongside whom June had spent many of her years on The Bill.

To go off on a tangent from there, Trudie Goodwin had a daughter, Elly Jackson. Around the time Trudie was finishing up on The Bill, Elly was starting a band called La Roux of which she was the lead vocalist. Later on, as a solo act, Elly used La Roux as a stage name.

Elly’s main vocal range is that of a soprano and most of her music takes that form. It’s also notable that unlike a lot of music in the synth-pop genre where lyrics are often very few and highly repeated, La Roux’s songs tend to follow a more traditional lyrical structure of having a bit of a story through the main verses and a repeated chorus. The first #1 hit for the band was Bulletproof and is a good example of Elly’s soprano vocals.

Personally though, while Elly’s soprano is quite powerful, I think Elly’s voice is just a bit better when she dials down the volume a notch and sings in a slightly lower register. My favourite song of La Roux’s is the somewhat creepy stalker song Fascination, which very much seems to describe a character that June Ackland would have taken great pleasure in arresting!

My 2nd favourite, and definitely in a lower register, is Tigerlily, which to my mind demonstrates Elly’s quite wide vocal range much more than any of her other songs.

I sometimes wonder if Elly had any interest in acting, because Trudie was no stranger to the stage and I think there could have been potential (and maybe still is) for them to team up as mother and daughter duo in a musical.

Samuel

Add comment March 2nd, 2025 at 06:48pm