I’ve been quiet lately and it’s not just on here. Sometimes there are days (or in this case, weeks) where no matter how much is going on, no matter how many thoughts are in my head, nothing comes out in words. The result is an extremely irritable me, so I’m going to try to talk now. I had an eventful Cinco de Mayo in which I got drunk enough to demand that I be allowed to sleep in my car while I sobered up. I lost a friend and co-worker to as-yet unexplained causes, largely suspected to be either an ischemic bowel or an abdominal aortic aneurysm. I received a drunk-dial from an ex-boyfriend who claims he is lonely and misses companionship. I sawed up a big chunk of the tree that fell on my fence in a windstorm last Friday. I read Yann Martel’s “The Facts About the Helsinki Roccamatios,” which was quite good. I finished four New York Times crosswords.

Well, maybe that’s something. I do like crosswords. E got me started on one a few weeks ago. He’d picked up the abandoned paper off the bar and started filling in blocks while he waited for me, then pushed it in my direction and asked me if I knew a four-letter word for Pindaric verses, starting with “o” (odes). We ended plodding through it for two more beers before we left, taking it with us and obsessing over the remaining blank squares for the rest of the evening.

We never did finish that one in its entirety and I cannot find the paper, but I did pick up a book of New York Times daily crosswords at Barnes and Noble that week. I’m not yet brave enough to tackle the Sundays yet. This particular book contains a selection of crosswords from the Times daily puzzles from 1951 to 2001. I logically decided to start at the beginning with 1951.

Well, holy bejeebus.

If you’ve ever done a Times crossword (or many others, I am sure) you will know how heavily they are based on current events, pop culture, and similar era-based references. 64 across: a 6-letter word for “part of Czechoslovakia” that begins with “MOR”? Is there a place called Moravia? Is there even a place called Czechoslovakia anymore? 3 down: second-generation Japanese-American, 5 letters, starts with “n” and ends with “eo,” although I am not certain about the “o.”

I left 20 blank squares on that one and turned right to page 51, a puzzle from 1992. Whee! I DO know the capital of Latvia (Riga, that was in high school global studies class) and “Henry or Jane of film” (Fonda). Puzzle done. On page 57, I breezed through “1995 Cage/Shue film” (Leaving Las Vegas) and “Mr. T’s family name” (Tero). This was more like it.

There really is no point to this post except to point out that older crosswords are hard and that it is easy to get obsessed with counting little bitty squares.

What’s a five letter word for “western lake,” in which the third letter is “h”?