The Japanese form of word play called dajare was investigated in the light of the concurrent multiple word activation mechanism proposed for spoken-word recognition. Analyses of a dajare database revealed distinct types of punning strategies, each of which can be seen as reflecting the activation mechanism. In the present study spontaneous conversations, compiled from a live Tokyo radio talk show, provided the dajare evidence. These results in spontaneous Japanese again confirm the activation predictions, suggesting that dajare is not a low form of wit: instead, it is clever exploitation of the the natural availability of multiple words in spoken-word recognition.