A thrilling temporary achievement. Quick History. As I was recovering from Sepsis a few years ago (fall 2019) in the hospital and rehab I had lost most of my physical strength and my mind was pretty scrambled. While in a rehab I got intense physical therapy but was pretty much on my own in the old brain department. A long time aficionado of the New York Times I turn to their puzzle department which I was barely familiar with and became obsessed with their crosswords and other word games. It took a while but I persevered and when I was able to solve my first NY Times crossword after the surgery I had hopes I would be all right.

As a writer, I have always enjoyed word games and I was soon addicted with a routine of working the puzzles every morning, recognizing that it would aid not only my recovery but long term help my craft. In late 2021 I became aware of a new online word puzzle, Wordle. In 2022 it was purchased by the New York Times and it became part of my daily routine mind challenge. I have played it nearly everyday since. (In Wordle you are given five chances to guess a five letter word each day. Your results tell you if a letter is in the right place or somewhere else in the word grid. You can’t just throw letters at the puzzle, you have to use actual words in your guesses. I choose to play the Hard version where you must work with the revealed letters in subsequent guesses.)

I usually did pretty well but was certainly not perfect. (I also post my results to X (formerly Twitter) where it is viewed and compared by other players.) Shortly after the Times bought the game their programers created WordleBot – my talented nemesis. It is a computer program that also ‘plays’ that days word challenge and then compares its result to yours. It is dealing with a huge reservoir of words that it compares the clues with to get a result. Some days I would do well in comparison but usually WordleBot is much better and faster in solving. It also uses mass computing power to determine the optimal ‘starting’ word for the fastest results. That word has shifted over time but they claim the best word is PLATE. I currently use the starting word recommended by my puzzle hero, Will Shortz (the longtime editor of the New York Times Crossword Puzzle) who uses AROSE. WordleBot smugly informs me that only 0.6% of puzzlers start with that word, but I stubbornly stick to it and have a few strategies to arrive at my followup words.

Over time WordleBot usually beats or ties the number of times it takes me to solve the puzzle but I try to keep pace with it. It also provides a ‘scorecard comparison’ after each day. Usually I lag a few points behind the superhuman computer program. But due to some fortunate word results based on our starting words and a little perseverance by me, this morning I have bested WordleBot on recent puzzles.

As you can see from this morning’s scoreboard, over the last 14 games, I have solved the puzzle in 3.4 steps whereas WordleBot has taken 3.6 steps. Victory! Believe me, this will not last. WordleBot will again edge me out but I will take a victory lap on these results and be thrilled. It is a small thing, and certainly aided by good fortune, but an achievement nonetheless. Hey, gotta take little successes where I find them.