In his latest column, "Flong time no see: my adventures with a daily dictionary dip", David Astle explains that "flong" is a printer's term for a mould made from wet pulp, pressed onto the page, and shares its roots with "flan". He notes that journalists used the word to describe any non-topical article used to fill a slow news day, adding that his column is "pure flong".

Astle describes his habit of sifting a random double-page of words each morning, jotting down the novelties he finds in the Collins English Dictionary. His discoveries include "delope" (to shoot one's pistol deliberately above an opponent's head to call off a duel), "petalism" (a form of ostracism in ancient Syracuse involving olive leaves), "ristra" (a chilli string hung in the kitchen), "stegophile" (one who loves to climb buildings), "kantele" (a traditional Finnish zither), "gytrash" (a ghostly dog on a lonely road), "stupe" (a damp cloth), "nesh" (sensitive to cold) and "cabestro" (a horse's halter made of hair).

The column acknowledges the wider news cycle, including global news, the fuel crisis, the AI squeeze, Gaza, Ukraine and Trump, and suggests readers may need to untether for a moment, whether through music, running or reading a dictionary.