stevebwriter.bsky.social

The primary dictionary meaning of “kite” is neither - it’s the bird.

In my case, the key word is “kites”. Their question is about cultural traditions involving flying toys. My previous posts, I realise after a moment’s thought, were probably more abstract, about quadrilaterals with equal adjacent sides.

“As someone who has answered questions about ____ before, can you answer this question?” I wonder what #Quora's hit-rate is for sparking genuinely useful answers with this approach.

Today’s #nineletterword at mhb.nz is “explosive“. Amazingly, “plosive” is not accepted as a real word. #Google it and you could find yourself, as I did, in Emily Dickinson’s poetry.

How many points would you five (sic) our Olympic competitors as they soard (sic) into the air on their snowbaords (sic)?
Maybe it’s the excitement, but the frequency of misprints in RadioNZ coverage seems above average even for sports reporters.

No, it’s taken off in a different direction. Today’s (Feb 4 2026) is one of those words whose chief us is for word-puzzles; few people use it in ordinary speech.

I look forward impatiently to tomorrow’s answer, to see if the repeat of 2021 continues.

In apparent celebration, today’s Wordle is a repeat of the First Wordle Ever, from 2021. Anyone remember it?

A significant day for Wordle. Today the daily word puzzle abandoned its principle of making all its answers unique. From now on, repetition of an already used answer will be allowed.

It‘S abit pretentious, but I still indicate the day of the week by its planet symbol - so I find myself crossing 2s and lower-case hs In ordinary writing

From my other #nineletterwords site:PILCHARDS. I used to love eating them as a child, usually at my Cockney paternal grandmother's home.
I was trying words featuring CRISP.

Today's #nineletterword: MISSIOFUN. She sounds like the life of the party; but the anagram is FUSIONISM - a political philosophy combining elements of “left” and “right“.

#autocorrect of the day (so far) “eunuch“ when I was trying to type “runup” (to ChristmaS).

Facebook is sending me "friend" requests from people I meet often IRL but whose surnames I realise I've not known until now. I suppose I didn't consider it important and never thought to ask.
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Surprised to get into this account remotely and be able to post. Is it working properly?

…or a lingua Franca.

Also COSTLIER and CREOLIST. Linguistics has its specialists, and a creole is different from a pidgin or a dialect.

Pair. I keep missing out letters on this annoying on-screen keyboard.

Official answer: ELICITORS. Eight-letter approximations: CLOISTER and CLITORIS -an interesting pai.

I don’t see why SOLICITER, in the general sense of someone who solicits something, shouldn't be a valid word. Recent #nineletterword puzzle doesn’t have enough Os to do it professionally.

What long or obscure word do you remember having discovered in early childhood? The one I've been thinking of recently is PACHYDERM (thank you R. Kipling); but I've just re-encountered FERRULE. It was in a comic-strip detective story, where someone's umbrella tip left a print in soft ground.

BRIGNONUS? anagram of SUBORNING.

I'm also interested to see the eight-letter words generated by missing one of the letters. They often have nothing to do with the main word, or with one another.
HAILSTONE, for example, gives rise to HOTLINES and TOENAILS.

Really messed that one up. Should be “salt-tolerant“, “glassmaking“ and “ashes are” (missed space).
I hate on-screen keyboards.

Other current nine-letter words: BARRENEST (my first guess ARSEBERNT; also BANTERERS).
AICONVENT (robotic nuns?) = NONACTIVE. CLAPITUNE? INCULPATE.

#nineletterword of the day: GLASSWORT. As I thought, it's a plant. Genus Salicornia. Grows in marshes. Salt-toleran. Its ashesare considered a rich source of sodium carbonate, used in glassmakin.

The appeal of a #ninletterwored is possibly that it's long enough to be interesting but short enough to be easily remembered. But does adding words like calamites and petiolule to my vocabulary achieve anything meaningful?

“How” prompts for “do”, “to” or ”many”. But”what” prompts for “is”, “are” or an emoji that looks lIke a grumpy cat's face. #whatisthat?

Answer: ”who“ prompts for “is”, “are” or “wants“; “when” for “you”, “I” or “are”; ”where” for “is”, “are” or “do” (in that order of preference) “why” prompts for “is”, “do” or “are” (different order)…

We (should) all know about the “six Ws” - the questions who, what, where, when, why and how, that any piece of writing should answer - but (it occurs to me to ask) what words does autocomplete prompt for to follow each of those question-words?