Back in 2022, in a bid to outwit my mother in our daily Wordle battles, I wrote some C# code to explore optimal starting guesses. You can read about that experiment here. Fast forward two years, and my Wordle addiction is alive and well. The daily challenge remains as compelling as ever, but it’s the family WhatsApp group – where scores are shared, victories boasted, and failures commiserated – that adds an extra layer of fun. ...
Like (it would seem) most of the rest of humanity, the start of my 2022 has been immeasurably enhanced by starting each day playing Josh Wardle’s charming word game Wordle. Which got me wondering – what are the best starter words to play in the opening lines at Wordle? I have been habitually using “ADIEU” as my starter word, reasoning that it contains a large number of vowels. But is D a particularly common consonant? And should I be trying to get O in there rather than the less frequently used U? I decided to do some computer-aided analysis to find the answer. ...
Isn’t it funny how one’s tastes change as maturity progresses? I used to spend my summer holidays at the sea-side, playing in arcades and seeking the perfect milkshake (lime); more recently I’ve been spending them in the highlands, playing on the hills and seeking the perfect dram (lagavulin).Hmmm… I think I may have mentioned that the wife is away in the States for a while.At the start of this period of solitude, I panicked, wondering whatever I could do with myself, and came to the conclusion that it would be a good idea to buy a computer game to while away the hours.After all, I spent much of my formative years killing time on a variety of computer and console games, so why not rekindle that prior love affair? So it was that I bought The Sims 2, a truly excellent game, and had an enjoyable evening trying to motivate my wee Sims to improve their skills, better themselves, and generally enjoy life.All good harmless fun. ...