Date: June 11, 2021
Post # 23
There's an AP(ostrophe) for that!
We all learned about apostrophes back in school, right?
But it seems a little refresher will help.
Some recent examples of incorrect use of the apostrophe
- Trekking around Sierra's adventuring.
- Lord let's only honorable humans.
- Frijoles, nice salsa, margarita's galore!!!
- Given some Reebok's someone had.
- Walkman's are extinct; therefore, cassettes.
- Lovely daughters love "Purple" female matriarch's
- The Starbuck's recipe.
- Liquid's aren't denser.
The general, most common rules:
- Simple plurals - add s, no apostrophe.
- Possessives and contractions - use an apostrophe.
Examples, using an apostrophe:
- Contractions (letters are dropped):
Let us -> Let's
Did not -> Didn't
I will -> I'll
- Possessives:
Toy belonging to the cat -> The cat's toy.
When NOT to use an apostrophe
- To form a plural by adding -s.
One cat; two cats.
- A third person singular verb
Dad lets us play bingo.
When It Can Be a Little Confusing
Adding " 's " has two different uses.
- The possessive, as above.
- A contraction for "something is", "something has", and perhaps others.
In the following (rather contrived) example we see
(1) a contraction (has),
(2) a possessive,
AND (3) a plural (no apostrophe):
Often we see that an
apostrophe's 1 been used incorrectly.
Apparently, the
apostrophe's 2 use can be confusing,
leading some to put
apostrophes 3 in the wrong places.
But wait - this is English
And that means there must be exceptions!
This is undoubtedly not an exhaustive list.
- Possessives of plurals ending in s: States' rights.
(State's rights would refer to just one state.)
- Some pronouns such as "ours": This one is Joe's, that one is ours.
- Its vs it's: the first is possessive, the second a contraction of "it is".
- For acronyms, sometimes an apostrophe appears in the plural form:
SUV's are quite popular these days.
- Plural of letter: Dot your I's and cross your T's.
(To avoid confusion with words like as, is, or us.)
- Plural of a word outside of its own meaning: Do's and don'ts.
How about that one for being confusing?
Date: May 19, 2021
Post # 22
Split Words topic
This is pretty simple in concept,
but might seem complex from its description.
Here are a few names it might be given:
- Split Words
- Four letters - two words
- A- b C- d
Here's what it means:
On a four-letter round, write a single two-word phrase
that spans all the letters.
First word covers the first two letters,
second word, the last two letters.
The first word starts with the first letter,
the second word starts with the third letter.
Here are some examples:
- T R G W → Tia- ra Glo- wed. (Tiara glowed).
- H M B R → Hu- mphrey Boga- rt (Humphrey Bogart).
It's better, if the letters allow, to have the split be normal hyphenation, on a syllable boundary:
- C R A S → Cor- rect An- swer (Correct answer)
- B F W M → Beauti- ful Wo- man (Beautiful woman)
Date: March 27, 2021
Post # 21
Word Association topic
This topic originated from a UK game show, where
the players are given three "clue words" and have to
guess what they suggest.
Vote for acros which have words that would lead you to
the topic, rather than words that are related to it,
but also to other things just as well.
The words should be more closely related to the topic
than to other things, and more so than other words.
Here are some examples:
- Word Association: The Pacific Ocean
Good clue words:
- Hawaii, Tahiti, Guam, etc. (Places in it.)
- Balboa (European "discoverer" of it)
- Deepest (it's the deepest ocean)
- Marianas (the deep trench)
Not so great clue words - could be any ocean.
- Sealife, Islands, Whales, Waves, ... etc.
- Word Association: Egypt
Good clue words:
- Pyramids, Sphinx, Cleopatra, Hieroglyphics
- Pharaoh, Rameses, Tut(ankhamun)
- Osiris, Isis, Ra (their gods)
- Cairo, Alexandria, Sinai
- Nile (strong association with Egypt)
Not so great clue words - could apply elsewhere
- Desert, sand, hot, camels, nomads
Date: Aug 24, 2020
Post # 20
Cheat-cros
Normally, "cheat-cro" refers to writing an acro
that bends the rules, via spelling, grammar, or
meaning, often using a made-up word.
In this post, it refers to word acro rounds where
the topic and the letters were CHEAT, which has
happened three times in recent weeks.
Here is what various players wrote on those occasions:
The numbers following the names indicate number of votes
and bonus points, either for winning the round or voting
for the winner.
Amethyst 1,0, Cons have effectively aced test.
Blahblahblah 0,0, Clandestinely hid every answer today.
Blahblahblah 2,0, Caught husband entertaining a trollop!
Bumpy 1,1, Copied history exam answers? Tsk!
Bumpy 2,0, Copying homework - exactly a thief
Bumpy 3,3, Copies homework, exams, and tests.
chicmic 0,0, Caught having extramarital affair tonight.
chicmic 2,1, Careless husband's elusive affair's tossed.
kittypower 1,1, Classmate has extra arm treatments.
kittypower 2,1, Classmate hid exam answers there.
klj 0,0, Can hear everyone assume that.
klj 0,1, Come here everyone and try......
MrPuzzle 1,1, Caught husband's extra-marital affair: texting.
MrPuzzle 2,3, Card's held extra at table.
MrPuzzle 3,3, Card's hidden: extra Ace there.
SLUGGO1969 0,0, Can't help examination and test.
Sxystar 1,0, Choosing help.. especially at test.
Sxystar 1,1, Calculator help explains acing test.
virgingoods 0,0, Conspiracy: having East amass trumps.
virgingoods 0,0, Corrupt high-schooler employed avoidance tactics.
virgingoods 1,0, Corruption has extended all throughout.
Date: Mar 29, 2020
Post # 19
Who's the fastest Acroer of them all?
These statistics show the average time in seconds
players take to write their acros.
Additional columns give a breakdown, in actual numbers
and percentages, of acros written within certain time
boundaries (under 20 sec, 21-30, 30-45, over 45).
These numbers are generated from games between Mar 18 - 29, 2020.
Player # avg <20 <30 <40 >40 (Percentages)
Amethyst 113 30.984 23 32 44 14 20.4 28.3 38.9 12.4
MrPuzzle 184 36.211 22 38 73 51 12.0 20.7 39.7 27.7
klj 299 37.872 22 68 109 100 7.4 22.7 36.5 33.4
Tanteniff 168 39.804 15 28 52 73 8.9 16.7 31.0 43.5
Blahblahblah 455 41.138 54 63 116 222 11.9 13.8 25.5 48.8
TheTornado 86 41.268 6 18 21 41 7.0 20.9 24.4 47.7
SLUGGO1969 181 41.356 13 21 65 82 7.2 11.6 35.9 45.3
amorphous 224 42.318 10 33 77 104 4.5 14.7 34.4 46.4
bilbolives 290 43.020 3 34 118 135 1.0 11.7 40.7 46.6
virgingoods 243 44.341 9 25 83 126 3.7 10.3 34.2 51.9
electrobanshee 14 46.362 0 3 1 10 0.0 21.4 7.1 71.4
kittypower 221 46.926 4 13 67 137 1.8 5.9 30.3 62.0
chicmic 388 48.261 10 28 81 269 2.6 7.2 20.9 69.3
cb750gal 233 48.333 3 14 62 154 1.3 6.0 26.6 66.1
peanut11 137 48.454 0 11 35 91 0.0 8.0 25.5 66.4
Sxystar 53 49.736 1 3 9 40 1.9 5.7 17.0 75.5
Date: Mar 16, 2020
Post # 18
Repeated topics in Word Acro game
Due to a lapse by the administrator, some of the words
used as topics were not deleted from the active lists,
and a couple got reused the following week.
It is interesting to see how the same players did, or, more
often, did not write a similar acro the second time around!
Round 4: ROSTER
Blahblahblah,3,3,Repertoire of sports teams entering race.
kittypower,1,1,Record of subjects that enjoy results.
virgingoods,1,0,Recording of students that enter room.
chicmic,1,1,Regimented order showing team's eventual routine.
MrPuzzle,1,1,Regulars our sports team expects routinely.
cb750gal,0,0,Recording our scores? That's entirely rude.
klj,0,0,Record only students taking everything required.
Round 9 ROSTER
virgingoods,4,4,Record of students tested; everyone's reporting.
peanut11,2,0,Roll of some team's essential recruits.
chicmic,1,1,Rows of some teams entering room.
kittypower,0,1,Register of subjects taken, entire round.
klj,0,1,Record only some then erase regulars.
Round 5: AIRFARE
Blahblahblah,2,3,Airline income required for anyone requesting entrance.
virgingoods,2,0,Airline is recounting funds amassed routing everyone.
cb750gal,2,1,Apparently, it's required for airport rendered excursions.
klj,1,0,American is really fast and rarely expensive.
MrPuzzle,0,1,Am infuriated! Ridiculous fare airline really expects?
kittypower,0,0,Airplane is requiring funds advance regular entry.
chicmic,0,0,Airlines initally refunding fares after rouge epidemics.
Round 5 AIRFARE
virgingoods,4,4,Airline is reducing fares and repealing exclusions!
kittypower,2,1,Airplane is requiring fee at reboarding everywhere.
MrPuzzle,1,1,Airline is reducing fares: aid requested: "Emergency!".
klj,0,1,Alas it requires faith and real energy.
chicmic,0,0,Airline is refunding fares after rare epidemic.
Date: Jan 7, 2020*
Post # 17
Double Digit Multiplicity
*As of Oct 20, 2022 there have been,
these numbers of occasions when one player has
had more than one Double Digit acro in one night:
- Two: 346 times
- Three: 82 times
- Blahblahblah: 34
- blahblahblah: 1
- MrPuzzle: 25
- klj: 6
- chicmic: 4
- bilbolives: 3
- Tanteniff: 2
- kittypower: 1
- SLUGGO1969: 1
- cb750gal: 1
- amorphous: 1
- Ari72119: 1
- Stanky: 1
- Bumpy: 1
- Four: 11 times
- Blahblahblah: 6
- MrPuzzle: 3
- PaddleFoot: 1
- amorphous: 1
- Five: 3 times
- Blahblahblah: 3
- Six: 2 times
- Blahblahblah: 2
And the group has produced large numbers as follows:
- Six: 25 times
- Seven: 14 times
- Eight: 4 times
- Nine: 1 times
- Ten: 3 times
Date: Dec 7, 2019
Post # 16
Weird Acro Letters
Not much to say about this:
Or this:

Date: Oct 31, 2019
Post # 15
Letter Distribution
"Seems like there were a lot of vowels tonight".
No, only slightly more than usual.
October 31
A 10 6.7%
B 2 1.3%
C 7 4.7%
D 6 4.0%
E 5 3.3%
F 11 7.3%
G 9 6.0%
H 12 8.0%
I 9 6.0%
L 17 11.3%
M 5 3.3%
N 8 5.3%
O 8 5.3%
P 5 3.3%
R 3 2.0%
S 13 8.7%
T 11 7.3%
U 4 2.7%
W 5 3.3%
36 vowels 24.0% of 150 letters
All of October
* 24 0.6%
A 306 7.9%
B 241 6.2%
C 175 4.5%
D 186 4.8%
E 86 2.2%
F 209 5.4%
G 160 4.1%
H 308 7.9%
I 202 5.2%
L 169 4.3%
M 246 6.3%
N 172 4.4%
O 206 5.3%
P 156 4.0%
R 85 2.2%
S 301 7.7%
T 341 8.8%
U 40 1.0%
V 1 0.0%
W 278 7.1%
Z 1 0.0%
840 vowels 21.6% of 3893 letters
21.6% of 150 = 32.4 ... there were about 3 more vowels than you'd expect.
Date: Oct 13, 2019
Post # 14
Double Digit Timeline
Here is a graph showing accumulation of Double Digit Acros,
for the leading players, over time.
Graph