diff --git a/src/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/editor/widget.py b/src/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/editor/widget.py
index 7fc2bf2768..6b2a1bc8e7 100644
--- a/src/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/editor/widget.py
+++ b/src/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/editor/widget.py
@@ -27,7 +27,7 @@ from calibre.gui2.tweak_book.editor import (
 )
 from calibre.gui2.tweak_book.editor.help import help_url
 from calibre.gui2.tweak_book.editor.text import TextEdit
-from calibre.utils.icu import utf16_length
+from calibre.utils.icu import utf16_length, primary_sort_key
 from polyglot.builtins import itervalues, string_or_bytes
 
 
@@ -572,7 +572,7 @@ class Editor(QMainWindow):
                         ac = m.addAction(_('Add this word to the dictionary'))
                         dmenu = QMenu(m)
                         ac.setMenu(dmenu)
-                        for dic in dics:
+                        for dic in sorted(dics, key=lambda x: primary_sort_key(x.name)):
                             dmenu.addAction(dic.name, partial(self._nuke_word, dic.name, word, locale))
                 m.addSeparator()
 
diff --git a/src/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/spell.py b/src/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/spell.py
index 8e48dd98e7..d0238905ac 100644
--- a/src/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/spell.py
+++ b/src/calibre/gui2/tweak_book/spell.py
@@ -1145,13 +1145,12 @@ class SpellCheck(Dialog):
         self.find_word.emit(w, self.words_model.words[w])
 
     def initialize_user_dictionaries(self):
-        ct = str(self.user_dictionaries.currentText())
+        ct = str(self.user_dictionaries.currentText()) or _('Default')
         self.user_dictionaries.clear()
         self.user_dictionaries.addItems(sorted((d.name for d in dictionaries.active_user_dictionaries), key=primary_sort_key))
-        if ct:
-            idx = self.user_dictionaries.findText(ct)
-            if idx > -1:
-                self.user_dictionaries.setCurrentIndex(idx)
+        idx = self.user_dictionaries.findText(ct)
+        if idx > -1:
+            self.user_dictionaries.setCurrentIndex(idx)
         self.user_dictionaries.setVisible(self.user_dictionaries.count() > 0)
         self.user_dictionaries_missing_label.setVisible(not self.user_dictionaries.isVisible())