"Ti-ra-la-la-i-tu!"

Before our words were listed I noticed mine were one more and couldn't tell how, and when the list arrived I found a bedtime guess of dreck (I would really, wouldn't I?) was actually right and was the extra number. There are plenty of Yiddish words in it so although I hadn't been aware of it at the time many more have turned up since.

My bedtime guess last night was correct, but I didn't win as two other people guessed the same. Such is life. I prefer to have the pleasure of seeing those green letters anyway. I do have set words for my first guess with many of the starter letters and it's surprising how (relatively) often the words turn up. I've won three times with one word and I know it's come up at least once more when I was asleep - and I'm not telling you what it is.

I hope you have 'boast' on your list of words to try, Mehaul. Just saying....

Rossian, I'm the same in having set guesses for certain two letters. Often I think they'll never pop up, but I persevere and some of them eventually do.

I just hope your sets aren't the same as my sets, otherwise we'll be having a set to.

I don't want to 'brag' too much, just a little gloating every now and then will suffice.

Vroom vroom

There were 30 runners up for this word, what is the record number?

I've never counted, but fjord always gets a large number of runners up too.

And I remember once seeing a word beginning with something obscure (I think it was "ft"), a lot of people guessed (or more likely googled) that one.

I would think that obscure words get more runners up because they are more likely to be THE word. With a start off of Fj---there aren't that many more possibilities!

okay, Surdoux just made me snort pepsi through my nose. I'll be filing suit shortly (that HURT lolol)

Adamm7: I'm a little slow on the uptake (more often than not), but I just recently noticed your "signoff" is a Horizontal Homer. That's quite good, really.

Shuehorn: not too many (English) possibilities, but I'm always amused to look over the entries and see words that folks have "made up". Some of them are frequently creative/clever : )

Fjorenlightenment, not ours?
Fjorsake possibly?
Submitted fjorconsideration.
signed,
Zaphod Vreeblebrox
(or was it Slarty Bartfast with the fjords?)

I remember 'lwei' getting 56 once.

No pepsi, Coke!

After months and months and months of trying I finally won my first Crystal Ball word yesterday (just guessed first word that came to mind before the word guesses were checked). Then I won three more times - twice today within a 3 hr period. I just won the last one because of a lucky guess. So I have no real strategy... I just use the first word that comes to mind. There must be something in the water.. or my new allergy medication :P.

Sometimes luck is on your side. Mostly it isn't. Well done on your wins. Next stop is 25 of them.

Pretty much after it got going I noticed exactly the same thing. I'd win a few in a day, other people would, often two or three in a row, and then nothing for a week or more. Everyone was still playing so it wasn't just related to attendance, and somehow winning one seems to focus people to get in the right energy frequency. It makes no logical sense at all but keeps happening. If anyone hasn't noticed look out for it now, you'll often see the same name on the win list a few times on some days and it's different each time when it is. There's a decent study in there for someone.

It is 3.09, I am looking into the crystal ball. The word I see is 'Llama'. I also see there will be a record number of runners up. Return at 3.45 to see if I was right on both counts. I'm guessing over 60.

You were not right - the word was 'llano'! Who knew?

I must need new batteries... Never heard of it!

To make good predictions, you need to use the book, not the ball. Battery failure rates (iaw/ MIL-Handbook-217 rev J) are quite high. I suggest using a wall outlet 115V/50-60cycles source with battery only as a back-up supply with scheduled replacements at six month intervals. Your exhibited failure rate and mean time between failures (MTBF) will be in the millions of hours and not weeks like a battery only system. Not much you can do about the crystal part, either you've got a good one or you don't. Just a suggestion...

Sounds like someone has never been to Texas either...lol.

From dictionary.com:

"Llano" is the Spanish word for "plain", normally used inthe plural in Spanish. For example, the Eastern Plains region in Colombia is called "Los Llanos Orientales". I would imagine the borrowing into English seen in Texas has to do with the proximity to Mexico.

That's the first reason I joined here, to learn more trivia!

Not quite the ultimate record but a good one to begin with, 33 runners up

Apr 10 12 6:45 AM: MacSteed : czarina (87 guesses)
Runners up: Sunshine922 LousiannaPearl pathchi1d rossian gracie3 katlatta Saints2668 22crows jlb2117 Samuraiboii veronicavee Dreamcoat glogloglo jviking DizWiz fado72 TabbyTom Rowena8482 annetto rustic_les drewh2os birdman585 Dava1 Annaid KallDare6 raffucci xxFruitcakexx Cmax jaysforever Allegedly zorba_scank ASA wally119 coachpauly

I'm surprised more didn't go for czar, but I think czarina came up last time and they do have a tendency to revisit once begun.

Just record keeping, you have to get a lot of people with GH- or even more so with KW-, but BR- and an unusual word:

May 04 12 12:45 AM: weissmarc : brominate (48 guesses)
Runners up: Jane_and_Doug cjogo sportsherald fado72 ITSOUNO11 wally119 Dreamcoat

And it's not even like dacoit or tunrverein, the two old favourites which seem to make far more appearances than you'd expect. Very odd I'd say.

I think the system went a bit wrong, satguru, and actually put the winning word up before the game ended. Some people were smart enough to work out what had happened and enter that as their guess. As you can see, I wasn't one of them, but I did see it happen.

Edit to add - I've just had a look at the 'list of most recent secret words' and brominate appears twice even though it wasn't the winning word before blither. Something strange occurred.

Ah, someone reported that in the chats a week ago, it looks like there's a new bug (one I haven't seen despite rarely missing a game) so a good thing I pointed out so Terry can check the codes for issues.

Seems to happen during the funtrivia day change-over (looks like it's happening again now)

I saw that happen with Plume last week (which I paid attention to then unlike brominate) The day after saw a SO word (which I can't remember) come up at that time as last hours word, when it clearly wasn't since we had different letters. However on that occasion there wasn't a SO word coming up next. The day after I don't think this problem happened.
Now is the 4th time I've seen a word starting with different letters than the previous hour come up as last hour's winner at the change of funtrivia day.

I just came to post the same info. Once again, I didn't realise what had happened until too late.

I was the lucky winner this time, so have taken the opportunity to PM Terry about the problem.