Puzzles, posts, news and general word-chat.

Diabolically Arcane

Bingo. You’ve reached David Astle dot com, a carnival of words, puzzles and more words. Welcome aboard, and have fun.

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'Th' Friday Follies

12 July, 2013

See if you can recognise these two mystery voices in Newcastle’s Treasure Hunter Contest? Oops, I almost gave the answers away. One day I’m hoping to set one of these quests, a clue scramble around the region, though I can tell you know the grail will await you in a winery (winter) or a surf hangout(summer). That place teems with attractions – now with added clues!

Whack it up. Stir it up. A great podcast about Boston mobspeak, drawing on Yiddish, Russian and Shakespeare. And if you are a Sopranos fan, enjoy David Chase’s eulogy for big Jimmy Gandolfini.

And lastly, a bizarre story about a Melburnian restaurateur who wants to reduce ‘the’ to a symbol, in the same way the ampersand has supplanted ‘and’. What’s your take on this? What word would you reduce, and how? Or can we downsize any word with creative pizzazz? Like this:

Ozz = PIZZA/ZZ
-iki = DASHIKI
T c-ee = PLUNGER C/OFF/EE
INTR
T = INTR/OVER/T

What else?

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Rewording The Brain

Focus & memory, lateral leaps & logic - every aspect of cognitive health is lit in Rewording The Brain, a book revelling in how puzzles boost your brain. Part 2 equips your brain to conquer any twisty clue, plus the wild crossword finale. Pop science meets neural gameplay, Rewording is rewarding, and out now.

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Rewording The Brain

Care to renew your noodle? Rewording The Brain explores the latest neural studies, seeing how puzzles (and twisty clues) boost your neurons. Part 2 helps you crack such clues, and prep the grey matter for the crossword showcase to finish. More here

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101 Weird Words (and 3 Fakes)

From Ambidextrous to Zugwang, this mini-dictionary teems with rare or alluring words, plus bonus riddles, puzzles and fun word-facts. Dictionary detective will also nab the collection's three fakes. Ideal for late primary schoolers, or word-nuts in general.

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Gargantuan Book of Words

Sneeze words. Fake pasta. Viking slang. Gargantuan is a jumbo jumble of puzzles & games, mazes & quizzes, tailor-made for that wordy wonderkid in your life. Or anyone in love with letters, secret codes, puns, rhymes, emoji & all things languagey. More here 

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Recent Comments

Riddledom Rave

If you missed my riddle chat with Richard Fidler, then feel free to slurp the podcast at http://ab.co/1I9t1x5

Text-speak is creeping into Scrabble. Where do you sit?
OBVS I'm fine with it
Entrenched stuff - like LOL and OMG - but no more.
Words With Friends, maybe. Scrabble, no
Let the 'real' dictionaries decide first
Just the handy stuff, like FAQ and EUW
I mean, WTF?! No way
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