Storm Storm

Here's a game
Find a word that contains an unbroken combination of consecutive letters of the alphabet (any combo, letters can be reused)
Your score is the number of letters in the word minus the number of letters outside the combo

eg.
strudel: 7-3 = 4 (del are oustide)
feed: 4-0 = 4 (no letters outside)
highfive 8-2 = 6 (ve are oustide)

Highest score wins

I like the strategy element, Mauve.

Maybe for ease of reference, we should label all suggestions. So this may be dubbed Alphablock. Or Operation Strudel, etc

Just makes it easier for shortlisting honours too. But a shrewd starter - thanks. Can't wait to play it! STUVAC? FEEDBACK? JOHN MALKOVICH?

Feedback being the clubhouse leader on 8-1=7. I'm tipping that will be hard to beat.

"Of-Sides"

I'm tempted to simply proclaim 'of' the most versatile two-letter word in the language, but it will do to maintain it's up there.

The challenge is to find the phrase containing 'of' that is most ambiguous.

"A box of gold" could be a box containing gold, a box comprised of gold, a box from the town of Gold, or belonging to Mr Gold...

The winner would be the phrase with the most interpretations, with the caveat that each interpretation be given a subjective 'likelihood' score. In my gold example, our esteemed DAzzler might determine a score like this:

Meaning 1: 100% (highly likely to be in use out there in the wild)
Meaning 2: 100% (a little clumsy - 'golden box' would be more common - but still perfectly legit)
Meaning 3: 50% (that town looks a little contrived. Sure, it's a place in California, but still, you didn't know that, did you?)
Meaning 4: 20% (yeah, that's also contrived. But the surname does exist, just)

Total score 2.7. Sure, it's subjective...but then, the 'subjective of' is indeed one of the grammatical categories involved!

Can i suggest Composing an anagram, preferably with a cruciverbalist bent?

I've got an idea - Dovetails.

I've been mucking around with this for a little while and was going to suggest it anyway, so here goes:

1. Find two words of at least 3 letters. They can be the same length or with one letter length difference.

2. Dovetail the words into each other to make a new word. This means that you alternate the positions of the letters in your two words to make up the new word.

A couple of examples:

F-I-N-S- dovetailed with -A-R-E-S makes FAIRNESS.
-H-I-E- dovetailed into C-A-R-D makes CHAIRED.
C-O-S- dovetailed with -H-O-E makes CHOOSE.

WARNING: Addictive!

You could give prizes for eg the cleverest dovetail, the longest sensible dovetail, or dovetails where the definitions of all three words are related. Or if you wanted to get cryptic, then for a great clue for the dovetail.

Vile rustic crab?

@Mauve, nice idea.

Monopoly, 8-1=7

Bare-faced, 9-1=8

Abracadabra 11-2=9

@Bon, now that's just showing off.

How about a "Triple Gold" contest? Idea being to select a word or phrase (no restrictions, could be a name, place, etc) and provide three different cryptic clues using 3 different methods (eg anagram, container), including definition. The trick is to get 3 pearlers (obviously needs to be original) for the same word or phrase. Judging based on the best threesome....each entry being only as strong as the weakest link.

If I understand correctly, Abracadabra is actually 11-5=6, since the Rs separate the beginning and end letters from the interior clump (hence why highfive is 6, not 7).

Another possibility is to to ask for clues with a triple definition (1 straight, 2 cryptic), as turn up occasionally in crosswords.

(I made a grid recently where a clue had 4 definitions, more or less, which may be counted as excessive.)

Outside the Box: A chance to clue individual words of 16 letters or more. Best prize for the longest word, shortest (and most elegant) clue?

@DC - you're right. I didn't read the instructions properly. Yabbadabbadoo sadly misses out for lacking one miserable C.

DC is right. The consecutive letter clump must in fact be a clump, so abracadabra and bare-faced are no-goes. Or as DC says, abracadabra is 6, the clump being acadab, and bare-faced is only 3, the clump being ced.

But monopoly on the other hand is brilliant, SK.

Two tied clubhouse leaders on 7 points.

Simple Teaser Of Relative Mediocrity

This one is inspired by a real-life product called Biologically Appropriate Raw Food. Mmmmmmm, BARF. Who wouldn't want to eat that?!

Come up with a product/place/anything that creates an acronym in opposition to what you're describing. Perhaps you're a student of Francesca's Academy of Inspired Learning? Or maybe you're about to go for a run in your new Triathlon-Ready, Improved Performance Sneakers!

Funniest one (that doesn't sound too contrived) takes top spot.

That's the trap of all these good suggestions - we all want to play the games on offer!

Some early gems at both ends of the pool. (hey why not a mixed metaphor Storm?)

Tasteless Artless Cod-Ordinary.

Congrats on the first 12 months of the all new blog site DA. I first stumbled on your old Cassowary Crossing site as it was in transit, so the last 12 months have been lots of fun.

The highlight (IMO) would have to be the Loroso Report. It was a fabulous challenge and we were privileged to have had such an enthusiastic guest judge. Unfortunately you can't repeat the challenge as we are now in the habit of clueing each WOTW as soon as it hits the wire!

I'm sure someone has tried to transform words by moving each letter down the alphabet. Trouble is I can't think of any good examples, with common words. Abbreviations and resorting to the Urban Dictionary provide this:

IBM -> HAL (famous example)
BIB -> AHA
APPT -> ZOOS
BENJO -> ADMIN

In a similar vein to DC's transformations is to find what I like to call 'cryptomates' That is words which share the same letter pattern, like 'people' and 'indian',(123142) or 'geese','added' and 'asses' (12232). Prizes could go for the longest words or most amusing pairs.

hip-hop and tim-tam

Loroso and severe

giggles and titters

dermatoglyphics, misconjugatedly and uncopyrightables all share the same pattern, by dint of having no repeated letters. (Spotted them on a wiki page earlier today.)

Spellius Scriptum

To commemorate (commiserate) the end of the Harry Potter era, write and define the spell that you wish Harry, Ron or Hermione had used during the series.

You can (mis)appropriate an actual word, or invent your own. Perhaps Ron could have enlarged Draco Malfoy's rear end with 'Gluteus Maximus', or Harry could have reduced Voldemort to reciting rhymes with 'Seussillius'.

Funniest, most creative entries win. Two podiums - one for actual words, one for inventions.

Harry should have used "Paterjoculus" to get his dead dad to make some sort of lame dad joke from behind the mirror, in order to inject some sort of humour to the whole series.

Horse naming is an easy one to do. I could easily find some stallions' and dams' names for some interesting combos.

Some real racehorse e.g.'s over the years.....

Braless (Show Off II x Snuggles)
Not Tonite (by Postponed from Arousing)
Whitlam (Elusive Quality - Weaver Of Words)
Necking (Dracula x Befriend)
Accomplice (Canny Lad x With Me)
Prenuptial (Take Your Partner x Deal)
Strictly Ballroom (WILL DANCER x COLOURFUL LADY)
Mass (Foreplay x Debate) (Think about it!)
Chew Over (Lunchtime -Deliberation)
Self Portrait (Vain x Sketch)
Saville's Anguish (Final Card x Splendid Walk)
Camilla's Beau. (Casual Lies x Royal Infatuation)
You, which was by Awake out of Quick Score
Woodman out of Secretaire was called On The Desk
Thesis (Over x Intelligent)
Our Baby Bonus (Dash For Cash from Mother To Be)

New name for my game is Ouijam, because it's as though the glass on the ouija board has jammed and keeps emitting letters from the same region, sometimes flukily spewing forth part of a word or phrase.

Also, with all my fine-tuning of the points rules, the final score ended up being just basically the number of letters in the clump.

New high-score (allowing for phrases and sentences): Sturt Street (as in Sth Melbourne)

Score: 8 (sturtstr)

Splice two film titles to create two new titles for other films.

Eg:

Cowboys & Aliens + Friends with Benefits
=
Cowboys with Benefits (Brokeback Mountain)
+
Friends & Aliens (Men in Black)

Transformers:

Use a single word that allows you to transform (either replace or cover) a single letter, or group of letters, in another word, and then use it into a clue.

For example ‘governor' could mean g-over-nor, instructing you to transform ‘nor’ into ‘g.’

In a clue it could run something like:

Pursue governor through donor (3) DOG

Or to make it harder:

Pursue governor through backer (3) backer = donor, then transform ‘nor’ into ‘g’ for DOG

Best prize for transforming word/clue combo?

Miss herd Frazers

Rationalise the incorrect version of a commonly misheard word or phrase.

In an example from TV land: "This is all a moo point... Yeah, it's like a cow's opinion. It just doesn't matter. It's moo."

Recent thread 'Here Comes Trouble' should provide inspiration (all intensive purposes, auger well). Best rationale wins. Bonus points for laughs.

@em:

I'm not rich enough to be classed as hoi polloi. This is cause moi toyers are only Yokohama and not Pirelli. I don't pretend to aim as hoi as to hoi socoiety.

Defaceable is totally a word.
10 -2 = 8

BLURBAL REMEDY
Succinctly describe a well-known story or film with a cryptic slant.

eg. Styless pens, sheepish goatees and leaving in a huff.
(The Three Little Pigs)

whoa, my fellow wombat, an 8-pointer in one word! That puts you ahead of my two-word 8-pointer

LR

Dangerous Liaisons paired with Horrible Bosses...

Dangerous Bosses - George Bush and Rupert Murdoch map out a blueprint for saving Planet Earth

Horrible Liasons -The true story of Cheryl Kernot and Gareth Evans, narrated by Shane Warne and Liz Hurley

When I went to look up the meaning of acciaccatura yesterday, the Macquarie entry told me the word was a short appoggiatura.

Not just a LOL, but something Storm-ish in that little episode too. Opaque definitions...?

Try teaching them to 8 year old piano students!

I wonder if there's a word for long appoggiaturae

My Letters & Numbers Macquarie Dictionary defines psalterium as 'the omasum or manyplies'.

The etymology of psalterium is fascinating. Apparently so- called because the organ falls open like the pages of a book. Read 'em and weep!

I'm still trying to get my head around this entry in the Macquarie:

Octonion – number with 8 dimensions

The what...?

DA - obviously a concept with a lot of layers.

Eggsactly! ;)