The Perfect Crossword Puzzle
While writing the blog post a few days ago about how completing a crossword puzzle can be like a number of physical processes termed "explosive precipitation," I did a number of crossword puzzles on various sites. As I did, I discovered that some were frustrating, some were boring, and some provided just the right amount of challenge to be addictive.
So I got to thinking about why I like to return to certain sites again and again -- even when I really need to be working on something else. And I realized that they have certain things in common.
They're just challenging enough to require a certain amount of lateral thinking -- in particular, needing to consider multiple possible meanings of a brief clue. Is a single word meant in a different sense, perhaps one of several homonyms, or as a noun rather than a verb. Is there another meaning of a phrase beside the obvious one?
However, they're not so obscure that they leave one scratching one's head. That way lies frustration, especially if one is able to get only two or three right in a large puzzle.
And there's the most important part -- that the puzzle has enough relatively easy clues that one can start seeing some letters in other words, and perhaps see the clue in a new light. Then it becomes truly satisfying to break one's mind out of a rut and move forward to the point where the remainig clues become clear and the puzzle is finished.
So I got to thinking about why I like to return to certain sites again and again -- even when I really need to be working on something else. And I realized that they have certain things in common.
They're just challenging enough to require a certain amount of lateral thinking -- in particular, needing to consider multiple possible meanings of a brief clue. Is a single word meant in a different sense, perhaps one of several homonyms, or as a noun rather than a verb. Is there another meaning of a phrase beside the obvious one?
However, they're not so obscure that they leave one scratching one's head. That way lies frustration, especially if one is able to get only two or three right in a large puzzle.
And there's the most important part -- that the puzzle has enough relatively easy clues that one can start seeing some letters in other words, and perhaps see the clue in a new light. Then it becomes truly satisfying to break one's mind out of a rut and move forward to the point where the remainig clues become clear and the puzzle is finished.