[dredmorbius]

And you can escape asterisks using backslashes:

Italic

*Escaped asterisks*

\*Double-Escaped asterisks\*

  *Italic* 
  
  \*Escaped asterisks\*

  \\*Double-Escaped asterisks\\*

(tomhow seems to have goofed his escapes above. As I've done many times myself...)

[dredmorbius]

GP comment since corrected, for the curious. And/or future me.