Sunday, April 26, 2009

Sorry, Will Shortz, But "Secret Codons" Will Not Soon Be Replacing The "Crossword Puzzle."

The other day, NYT crossword puzzle editor and geek idol Will Shortz revealed a new word game in a post at wired.com -- no doubt for the 56-year-old puzzler to seem hip and "with it" to the kids who use this new-fangled "Internet" thing everyone keeps talking about.

But there's just one problem. It's too easy!

Here are the comments on Shortz's game, so far: "Fun, if easy." "I had a surprisingly easy time with this one." "Ditto. It looked overwhelming at first, but sort of flew by after the first word was in place."

Will, don't you get it? We like the crossword puzzle because we can't finish it. It taxes our brains and wastes our time. It rewards us for knowing who comedian Arte Johnson is. If we wanted something easy we'd challenge our fellow NYTPickers to a rousing game of Candyland, or maybe War.

Shortz's new game is called "Secret Codons." What the hell is a codon? According to one online dictionary, it's "a specific sequence of three adjacent nucleotides on a strand of DNA or RNA that specifies the genetic code information for synthesizing a particular amino acid."

Dude, seriously, you need to take a deep breath and start over.

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