Okay, so I saw this crossword puzzle title the other day, “Completely Disoriented,” in the New York Times, and I thought, “Hey, I can probably figure this out.” I’ve done a few of these before, so I didn’t think it’d be too hard.
I grabbed my phone and opened up the NYT Games app. I usually do these things on my laptop, but I was on the couch and feeling lazy. I found the crossword section and started on the puzzle. At first, I was cruising. I filled in a bunch of the across clues pretty easily. I felt like a genius, you know? Like I was on top of the world.
- Managed to get 1 Across “frozen water” which is “ICE” with no problem.
- Then 5 Across, “not a soul”, just breezed through that – “NO ONE”.
- And 14 Across, “___ Mahal”, I nailed that one too, it was “TAJ” obviously.
But then, I hit a wall. The down clues were way harder. I started second-guessing myself. I kept erasing and rewriting answers. I even tried to cheat a little and look up some hints online, but nothing seemed to help. I spent a good hour on this thing, and I still couldn’t get it.
I started to feel like the words were swimming on the screen. I mean, seriously, “Completely Disoriented” was the perfect title because that’s exactly how I felt. My brain was fried. I got frustrated and just gave up. I tossed my phone onto the coffee table and decided to watch some TV instead.
It was a humbling experience, to say the least. I thought I was pretty good at these puzzles, but this one showed me that I still have a lot to learn. Maybe I’ll try again tomorrow, but for now, I’m just going to relax and try not to think about those blank squares mocking me from my phone.
