When is a word a word?

Yes: negative studying is such a weakness of mine. And probably a big weakness of a lot of intermediate players. How many minutes do you think we all waste looking for sevens and eights that don't exist?

Sometimes I wish Zyzzyva would throw in a curveball such as AEILORT just to see if we're awake.

The problem with anagram quizzes is that we *know* there's a solution, so it's just a matter of finding it. Every week I get about 12-14 on David's "not-so-toughs", but I really think this flatters me. It's easy to find a seven from ABEEGPW when someone tells you there is one, but if that selection turned up in a real game, many of us probably wouldn't even look.

I wonder if anyone has any good tips for learning those non-words? Any foolproof nmemonics? Some that come to mind are:

IRELAND (every kid learns this one)
A SARNIE
RED LION
URINALE (I remember U & I LEARN + FAB MATHS)
SAURINE (should mean lizard-like but doesn't)
LUTRINE (should mean otter-like but doesn't)
RELATIO
AGONITE (and its plural)
TAENOID

I remember once seeing a list of the commonest non-word alphagrams, but this was pre-2007, and (come to think of it) probably TWL.

Is there anything out there you'd recommend?



Howard Warner