"Wordle"

Have you heard of it? I'm guessing most of you have. I always seem to be one of the last to pick up on anything new.

For any of you still languishing in the dark, it's a word game developed by a man who's name, very conveniently, is Wardle. He released it in October 2021.

You get six chances to guess a five-letter word. When you enter each guess, the background of each letter turns a color. If the letter isn't in today's word, it's dark gray. If the letter is in the word, but not in the right position, it's gold. And if the letter is in the word and in the right position, it's green.

Everyone I've talked to has a different method of working it out. If you Google it you can find hundreds of suggestions, including words you've never heard of, that use the most common letters in the alphabet to give you a head start. I consider that cheating. I prefer to stick with the vocabulary I know.

I've only been doing it for a month, but I've come up with a system that's worked well. "EARTH" is the first word I enter. Two vowels and two very common consonants. No matter what the results are, I put in "WOULD" next. That covers two more vowels and letters that pop up fairly often.

If I guess for line three, I'm always wrong. So instead, I came up with a third word, "SILKY." This usually gives me enough to guess the correct word.

Happily, I find that I'm not that competitive. I don't share my results or stress over needing five guesses instead of four. I may discuss a word that I found difficult or odd with someone who has done it that day. Like "ULTRA." I consider that a prefix, not a standalone word, but I didn't make the design the game.

I did cheat once. I ended up with a link to the game in my texts and email and they're not connected. The second day I played I got completely confused about the color code. I was thinking that gold is first place, so that meant those letters were in the right place. After my fifth guess I was totally lost and finally realized I was going about it backwards.

I moved to the game in my texts, started fresh, got the right answer, then went back to the email and filled it in. I didn't want it to look like I'd quit. Okay, I'm a little competitive.

When a friend wanted to introduce me to "Wordle," I was wary. I play one word game on my phone and that's enough down time. I'm always getting ads for other word games, and I'm very tempted, but I don't sign up. I know I'd lose hours playing, if I weren't vigilant. You'd never guess, but I love playing with words. When she told me that it comes once a day and that's it, I couldn't resist.

It also disappears once a day. I was totally bummed when I realized that I'd missed one and couldn't go back and catch up.

It's starting to get a bit predictable for me. I think I want to pick my first words more randomly to provide more of a challenge.

Which ensures that one day the word will be "EARTH." But I'll have moved on by then. That's how things work for me.

https://www.powerlanguage.co.uk/wordle/  Give it a try!