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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Homosexual Scorches Track

2 May, 2012

Came across a very funny blooper while on language safari yesterday. As you’d expect, the American Family Association has high moral values, explaining why their website’s software is geared to alter any untoward terms creeping into their dispatches. Vulgar, loaded or ambiguous words are auto-corrected for the safer and more saccharine kind.

Fine – unless your report is about a sprint star called Tyson Gay. Yep, you guessed it. With no subs on duty, or off-guard at least, the headline ran:

Homosexual eases into 100 final at Olympic trials

Read more about the gaffe here. Sort of makes you wonder what other breast traps (wait, that should have read booby!) are lurking in the language, or the who’s who of news coverage. Here’s a few more sanitised morsels we can await:

Malcolm Turnfiction

Indigenous Cheese

Sstoole the bottom of the barrel

Bear in mind that some of your ideas may well be spam-netted. (I’ll have to go down back and see what gems I can recover from the sewer…) But thougt you’d appreciate the cackle.

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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.

Medal

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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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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