Strategies for solving Wordle

The popular daily puzzle game Wordle requires one to identify an unknown five-letter word selected from a pool of around 2,300 common words. One tries to guess the word in as few tries as possible, with a maximum set at six. After each guess, you get three kinds of feedback: a letter is highlighted green if it is the right letter in the right location; yellow if it is a letter that is used in the word but appears in the wrong location, and grey if the letter is not used at all. I wrote about this a few weeks ago.

Some enthusiasts were not happy about the recent news that the word of the day, rather than being randomly selected, had begun to be curated by a human. (This may have been prompted by the fuss that occurred when the word of the day during the abortion crisis was FETUS.) This had resulted in some recent words being connected to a current event, so that the word last Thursday (Thanksgiving day) was FEAST and the day before that (the busiest driving day of the year) had been DRIVE. As a result, some people who were aware of this change had managed to guess the word on the first try. But it did not make them happy. I can understand why, because it shifts the puzzle from one involving logic to one in which you try to guess what is in the mind of the editor based on some current event, which is much less interesting. I had not been aware of this change, and there is some ambiguity as to whether, due to the criticisms, the puzzle has gone back to being random. I hope it has.
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Can the swastika be reclaimed?

In Sri Lanka, one would occasionally come across the swastika symbol in various places. This had nothing to do with Nazis. The swastika predates the rise of the Nazis by millennia and is a religious symbol for many people around the world and even in the US. It only became a hate symbol with Hitler.

The equilateral cross with its legs bent at right angles is a millennia-old sacred symbol in Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism that represents peace and good fortune, and was also used widely by Indigenous people worldwide in a similar vein.
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The symbol itself dates back to prehistoric times. The word “swastika” has Sanskrit roots and means “the mark of well being.” It has been used in prayers of the Rig Veda, the oldest of Hindu scriptures. In Buddhism, the symbol is known as “manji” and signifies the Buddha’s footsteps. It is used to mark the location of Buddhist temples. In China it’s called Wàn, and denotes the universe or the manifestation and creativity of God. The swastika is carved into the Jains’ emblem representing the four types of birth an embodied soul might attain until it is eventually liberated from the cycle of birth and death. In the Zoroastrian faith, it represents the four elements – water, fire, air and earth.
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