The NY Times offers a game called “Connections” every morning for free. In other words, you don’t have to subscribe to the paper to play, but I imagine it’s something like a loss leader in grocery stores. You get hooked and maybe want to buy a full subscription.
“Connections” has become part of Earl’s and my daily routine; in fact, it is the start of it. You can find the instructions online, so I won’t describe them here. Rather, here are some observations I have that could help novices.
First, most words on any given day are both nouns and verbs. This is important, although I assume not many people these days know the distinction. Trust me, it helps. Next, the most obvious answer is rarely correct. Lion, witch, and wardrobe are not about C. S. Lewis; instead they belong to The Wizard of Oz.
Then there are words within words. For instance, the four words tinder, ironic, leadership, and Goldilocks have nothing in common on the surface. But if you study more closely, you see that the minerals tin, iron, lead, and gold are imbedded in the longer words. So one must dissect the words in many different ways.
It’s an interesting game, and our record so far is fairly decent. Maybe you’d like to try one I made up. What do carrot, partridge, information, and mission have in common?
(Send me your answer in the comment section, which is at the bottom, far right, of every blog, after all the “share” icons.)
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