Crossword – A Nine Letter Word Meaning OCD?

I love crossword puzzles. In fact, I have already completed one before I began writing this. And another before I finished it. The truth is that I start almost every morning with one as I sip my coffee and eat my breakfast. My day seems off if I run short on time and don’t get to finish my daily puzzle. Is this a healthy habit that keeps my aging brain limber? Or is it a habit that I have allowed to get the better of me? It is a quandary. (Which is an 8 letter answer to the clue “perplexity”.)

In the old days, doing the crossword was a real chore. You needed the newspaper and a pencil. With an eraser. Only a masochist used a pen. And then you went to work. A nearby dictionary was a help, but I never seemed to have one at hand. Besides, a dictionary will not tell you the first name of the main character in a Shakespeare play. It would, however, help me with those words I always struggle with. For example, I seem to have a mental block when it comes to writing the word “equivalent”. It is spelled correctly here, but only after my computer’s spell check smacked me on the head and said “Hey dummy, it is not equivilent.”

I became quite good in those paper-and-pencil days of giving up before the puzzle was finished. If I did not know the answers to several of the clues – like Portugal’s second-largest city (Porto) or the name of the Phoenician goddess of fertility (Astarte) – I generally did not have time to start the series of research excursions necessary to finish the puzzle. So I had no trouble leaving the puzzle walking away from the unfinished crossword (and into my unfinished real life).

This was more common when I did the puzzle from my Wall Street Journal instead of the far simpler version from my Indianapolis Star. The puzzles in the Star seldom left me at sea (clue: state of confusion) but the Journal puzzle was more of a challenge. Both puzzles, I soon learned, got progressively harder through the week. I loved weekends because of the Journal’s big Saturday puzzle followed by the big Sunday puzzle in the Star.

Towards the tail end of doing print puzzles, my compulsion to finish each one grew – no doubt aided by the convenience of Mr. Google. Having Google and Wikipedia at my fingertips solved so many of my former crossword weaknesses. World maps were there for the asking, and a few keystrokes would easily get me to the best supporting actress nominee for the 2004 movie “Sideways”. (It was Virginia Madsen, for those who are curious). The online universe bolstered my weak areas of sports history, literary figures or modern music. Suddenly, the excuses for not finishing a crossword puzzle were – well, a four letter synonym for “vanished” that begins with “g”.

I eventually gave up on my print subscriptions to the Star and the WSJ, but for awhile retained an online Journal subscription. I found that most of my time there was spent on the online crossword. It took me a bit to wean myself from the version on paper, but I got there pretty quickly. That crossword puzzle six days a week became the one reason I was reluctant to finally drop my online subscription (where I had to renegotiate the rate every six months or so). And then I discovered something amazing – After my WSJ subscription finally lapsed, I discovered that my access to the crossword continued. I still have not figured out whether this is a technical glitch or an intentional decision by that publication. I know that many are fans of the New York Times crossword, but the Times requires a subscription to access, so that’s that for me.

But these days, I have to ask my self why I do the puzzles? Foreign terms are easily found through Google Translate, and the AI feature found in my web browser now saves me from the hard work of reading Wikipedia pages to discover, for example the name of the dwarf planet beyond Pluto. (It is Eris, for those of you who simply have to know.) Do I do the puzzles now for the challenge? Or am I simply meeting some requirement that my occasionally OCD mind is placing upon me? Perhaps it is both.

I suppose it doesn’t matter so long as I still find the puzzle to be something of a challenge. At least I go as far as I can before resorting to these modern research aids that allow me to quickly find even the most obscure things. And then there is the time factor – the online puzzle times me. My goal is 15 minutes for the Monday puzzle, with 5 minutes added for each weekday thereafter, and 1 hour for the Saturday. With my habit of doing the puzzles during my breakfast, I try to get halfway through Saturday and finish it on Sunday.

Maybe I just like some affirmation that much of the information that fills my head is not, in fact, as useless as most would have me believe. I have a passable knowledge of history, TV/movies, pop music through the ages (at least up into the 1980’s) and at least some genres of literature. I also have a pretty good mind for puns. For instance, “Soul seller” can be a clue for the auto manufacturer Kia instead of the literary Faust (or Joe, the main character from the movie version, “Damn Yankees.”)

So for the time being, I will continue to match wits with the editors of the WSJ online crossword, alternately feeling buoyed by knowing that bandleader Artie’s last name was Shaw and brought down by failing to know who voiced the characters of most modern Disney movies. Oh, and calling foul on the term “Vfour” being the answer to the clue “small auto engine” – because doesn’t everyone know that the only V-four that ever saw any kind of popular acceptance was in the German Ford Taunus of the 1960’s and 70’s that was never imported into the U.S. (and a 1960’s Saab that used the same engine)?

I guess that last paragraph answers why I insist on doing the daily crossword – it gives my complete emotional spectrum a full workout before I leave the house in the morning. And to think that I am accused of not exercising!

25 thoughts on “Crossword – A Nine Letter Word Meaning OCD?”

  1. I rarely carried pencils after being released from the institutional meat grinder of public education, so I nearly always did crossword puzzles in pen. I have gone through phases where I do them obsessively, and others where I rarely think of them… As I started outgrowing pop culture, fewer clues were relevant; and (no judgement) I never really enjoyed looking up the answers.

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    • I guess I like a challenge, and (often wrongly) assume that “I am sure I know this”. I am reminded of that famous line by the criminal in the original Dirty Harry movie, where Harry is pointing his .44 magnum at the crook, saying “I know what you’re thinkin’ – did he fire all six shots or only five?” After the crook decides to not reach for his gun, he says to Harry “I gots to know.” Just like that movie bad guy, I gots to know.

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      • That’s a great movie.
        I think another example of the idea was in an episode of House where someone accuses him “of thinking he’s always right” and he responds with “I find it difficult to operate on any other premise”

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  2. I still get an actual newspaper on Sundays, both my local, and the NYT. Those are the crossword puzzles I do. I can finish the local Sunday puzzle, a large one, before the end of the day; the NYT puzzle on the other hand, I can usually finish in between 1 and 3 days. I either give up after 3 days, or if it’s ridiculously difficult, I give up somewhere within that 1-3 day period. I used to use an erasable pen, but gave up because the ink was kind of pale, and now use a red gel pen, with corrections in blue gel pen. I rarely, if ever, have multiple corrections, so I’m OK there. I lived for a number of years in Washington D.C., and the WaPo also has a “progressive” puzzle getting difficult as the week goes on, but the Sunday puzzle was a killer because being a political city, it had clues like: “under-secretary to Lower Botswana from 1908 to 1909”. I used to do that one with my girlfriend, and we agreed that we would scan the puzzle first for those clues, and look them up on-line, as otherwise being impossible to know or even guess if you had some of the letters!

    BTW, I saw the documentary on puzzles/Will Shortz (Wordplay 2006) one time, and don’t do it. It shows people in contests with puzzles more difficult than the NYT, filling them in rapidly like it’s a penmanship contest! It’ll take the personal joy out of doing the puzzles; which I consider to be a very “personal” joy. I’ve also always done the Sunday puzzles with whoever I was living with at the time, trading it back and forth between ourselves as the day goes on, between playing music and making meals. For some reason, when that works out, I feel I’m with the “right person”.

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    • I have always kind of figured that once I really, actually retire I would like to get a real newspaper just for the crossword. And maybe buy a NYT for that purpose, which would let me stretch the experience of a tough puzzle out over a few days like you do. As it is now, Sunday is a work day for me, so I lack the time to luxuriate in an elaborate crossword experience.

      My better half has never had the slightest interest in crossword puzzles, so I tend to do them early in the morning when I have the house to myself.

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  3. Hi. It’s healthy to do puzzles. They keep our brains active. They are challenging. And they are addictive, but not harmful.
    I do crossword and sudoku puzzles. And my wife and I collaborate on doing Spelling Bee puzzles. which are published by The New York Times.

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    • I like Sudoku puzzles too. My favorite has become “Killer Soduku” in an online version, which adds irregularly shaped boxes within the grids which also have to total the small number in the corner of each box. The version I do online has a timer, and on a good day I can complete a “hard” level puzzle in 5 minutes. It has upped my ability to quickly add numbers in my head by a lot.

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  4. I love doing crossword puzzles. But somehow I can’t do them online. Google makes it too easy to cheat. I ended up spending more time searching than actually doing the puzzles. I get books now. There not as tough but better 4 me. 🤣😎🙃

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    • The online versions also allow cheating by giving up a letter or a word at the click of a mouse. I don’t resort to this until I become hopelessly stuck and need to move on to the next day’s puzzle. I ought to buy a book of puzzles to get the old-school analog experience again.

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  6. For whatever reason, crosswords fell off the radar long ago. However, I have been working jigsaw puzzles sporadically for several years. It got so bad one weekend, I had to stop at Hobby Lobby to buy one before returning home – and all 1000 pieces were together the next day. Yes, I have eased off from them since.

    The nice thing about a crossword is if you set it aside to finish later it doesn’t take up much real estate.

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    • I share your taste for jigsaw puzzles, but you are right – you have to commit a definite space to them, and woe be unto you if you need that space for something else before the puzzle is done!

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  7. OK, full confession…I have never liked doing crossword puzzles, or really any kind of puzzle (except jigsaw puzzles, which frankly I consider the use of “puzzle” there to be a homonym – or perhaps a homograph – since I make virtually no connection between the thing with the boxes you write in vs. the thing that Curious George once swallowed and wound up in the hospital over). I generally keep this opinion – the one about crosswords – under my hat since virtually every single intelligent person I know has a long lasting fondness for them. And of course, flying my “Hey! I don’t do crosswords!” flag would make me feel like a 5 letter word that Bugs Bunny meant when he called Daffy Duck a “maroon”.

    I don’t know why I don’t like crosswords, since I think I kind of have a mind for trivia and language. It’s just never managed to find expression in puzzles. And don’t even get me started on the NYT weekly cryptogram (only available in the print edition)…for which I have friends who solve them weekly and then are compelled to share them and thereby their inscrutable talents with words.

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    • I salute you! You are the guy who could be The Crossword Ace if you chose to be, but you find other, more productive ways to waste your time. Now I know at least one reason you have more time for repairs of niggling issues on your cars than I do.

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  9. Was never much interested in crossword puzzles, but I’ve been doing the Word Jumbles lately.

    The staff in my office receives electronic versions of local papers from small towns in our boss’s largely rural district. Those papers feature the Word Jumble (along with stories about locals being assaulted at the convenience store and detailed accounts of car accidents, which are strangely interesting). Those Word Jumbles are addictive.

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  10. Excellent post! Love how you worked in the crossword puzzle clues and answers.

    I have a crossword puzzle iPad app – each puzzle takes me a really long time because I rarely resort to looking up answers. I cheat by guessing a most likely word after I know at least one of the letters. The app tells you if you guess wrong, so it is easy to do trial and error!

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  12. Kudos to you for doing a daily crossword puzzle JP – even two of them! I have never done the “New York Times” crossword puzzle as it’s way too difficult and I would equate doing that crossword puzzle to watching Jeopardy. I don’t have TV now, but when I did, I did not excel at Jeopardy; Wheel of Fortune maybe. 🙂 I like Word Search puzzles – I still have some of my mom’s Word Search puzzle books she didn’t get to, but I prefer “Word Wipe” (word search puzzle) online and do that daily along with the “NYT” site’s “Wordle” and “Spelling Bee”. Unlike you, I don’t know enough about pop culture or sports to do the “NYT’s” “Connections” game. I usually bombed out on it, so I quit playing. I’m relying on Solitaire to keep my brain humming. As an only child, I played Solitaire a lot as a kid. I even had a board that you could place the cards so you could view each stack as you played, but it’s so easy and fun to do it online and it’s good mouse practice.

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