Twice As Nice: Exploring Echo Words
One of the clues you might find in our crossword puzzles is ‘Aimlessly (5-5)’ – answer WILLY-NILLY. It comes from will I, nill I – ‘I am willing, I am unwilling’. It is an example of a rhyming jingle.
Rhyming jingles are fun to use, even though they have the rather serious name of reduplicatives. [more…]
MEGA Competition Solutions – UK Issue 91
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Brain Training
Why are cryptic crosswords singled out as the most popular brain-sharpening tool? It seems that the task of solving cryptics really works in improving the way the pathways in the brain connect with each other.
As we age, it seems easier to remember events of our childhood than what happened yesterday. This has been attributed [more…]
Across Time: The History of Crosswords
Did you know that it’s been over one hundred years since the first crossword was created? Arthur Wynne, a Liverpudlian working in New York, was playing around with a puzzle for the Sunday edition of the New York World. He came up with a diamond-shaped puzzle with clues and squares in which to fill [more…]
Beyond Measure: Yoga & You
Hello!
In all traditional measuring systems, humans used their bodies as measuring standards, which is why some units are still based on the dimensions of the human body.
The inch represents the width of a thumb, which is why, in many languages, the same word is used for both ‘inch’ and ‘thumb’. In Dutch, duim means [more…]
