Wordle saves pensioner held hostage in her basement

And other stories from the stranger side of life

Wordle

The viral word game Wordle is thought to have saved an 80-year-old US woman who was imprisoned in her basement bathroom for 17 hours by an intruder who broke into her house in the dead of night. Police in Illinois were alerted to the predicament of Denyse Holt after she did not text her daughter with her Wordle score, reported The Times. Holt was saved and the man arrested. The local police chief said he did not play Wordle himself, but added: “I may have to start now”.

False teeth returned 11 years later

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  Chas Newkey-Burden has been part of The Week Digital team for more than a decade and a journalist for 25 years, starting out on the irreverent football weekly 90 Minutes, before moving to lifestyle magazines Loaded and Attitude. He was a columnist for The Big Issue and landed a world exclusive with David Beckham that became the weekly magazine’s bestselling issue. He now writes regularly for The Guardian, The Telegraph, The Independent, Metro, FourFourTwo and the i new site. He is also the author of a number of non-fiction books.