“Don’t make ’em too hard or people won’t buy ’em!”
After years and years of enjoying crossword puzzles as a pastime, suddenly there were nothing left on the supermarket shelves by Very Easy Crosswords and Sudoku. All the satisfyingly challenging crossword magazines were discontinued.
I called the publisher. What happened to my crossword puzzle magazines? The answer: “People stopped buying them, they were too hard.” Well ain’t that grand–and us with the most costly and intrusive “education” system ever devised by man.
“Three Letters: Popular Pet That Goes ‘Meow.'”
Not very satisfying, is it?
Hymn suggestion: He Touched Me. Yes, it is easy to see that the population is getting
dumber, and it is discouraging. I could spell better in second grade than a lot of people
can now. Sad.
They’ve been exceptionally effective at dumbing down the population.
Another song suggestion: Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus by Alan Jackson
I like that one a lot.
I’ve never been much of a fan of crossword puzzles. I often found the hints too vague, or they required knowledge of trivia I just never had the need to know. I prefer word search, as they appeal to my tendency to see patterns everywhere.
Having said that, it’s unfortunate that the “hard” puzzles have gone by the wayside. I suspect it is not so much that they are “hard”, but that people expect instant gratification, even in their puzzles. I’d they can’t get the answers right away, they don’t bother with the puzzle. They certainly won’t take the time to try and find the answer somewhere.
But easy puzzles are BORING!
True. I just find the “hard” puzzles aren’t so much “hard” as esoteric. Like the original Trivial Pursuit, for example. I could never get the “entertainment” questions, simple because I didn’t partake much in pop entertainment culture. I also didn’t care for popular sports (I liked playing sports, not watching them), so that was another category I could rarely answer questions for. I had zero use for the versions that were based on pop culture topics or decades.
Still better than Sudoku. I could never figure out the point of those. No idea why they are popular.
I have no idea how to do Sudoku.
My mom did the Sunday morning paper’s crossword every Sunday as it were part of the church service we went to. She would eventually get them all. I never picked up the habit. My wife is a wiz at them.