I can’t remember a day that didn’t start with coffee. There must have been a time in my life before coffee — a Sam B.C., if you will — but I don’t know the point at which that era ended and the present one began. Either way, I’ve been drinking coffee for at least five years without fail. Is that a coffee streak or a coffee habit? It’s definitely a caffeine addiction. As to the other labels: I guess it depends on how you define them. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, a streak is “a temporary run (of luck).” Good or bad, it’s short-lived, and usually outside of one’s control. A habit, on the other hand, is a “settled disposition” that results from “frequent repetition of the same act.” In Games parlance, the meanings are practically reversed: A streak is the product of tireless (and, ideally, joyful) repetition, whereas a solving habit simply suggests you can be found, on any given morning, solving a crossword. A habit makes no guarantees; a streak relies on them. My colleague Elie Levine interviewed a handful of die-hard streakers — nice try, readers, but they’re clothed — about the measures they take to keep their scores alive, and I am genuinely humbled by the levels of commitment therein. Some solvers seem to protect their streaks as they would a child; one woman did so while giving birth to hers. All experienced the same shift from habit to obsession: What began as a desire to solve every day became a need to solve at all costs. Personally, I refuse to maintain solving streaks, because keeping them alive feels like inflating a balloon. The more I solve, the bigger it gets, and the louder the inevitable pop. (Did I mention I’m afraid of balloons?) A short stint, I can handle. There’s a Wordle challenge this week — in honor of the game’s fifth anniversary — that gives you a badge for solving every puzzle between today and Friday. Child’s play! Or adult’s play, I guess. The other reason I don’t care for streaks, though, is that I love pleasant surprises. And there is nothing more satisfying, during a flight delay or in a long bathroom line, than discovering a game in the archives that I never got around to playing. As long as there’s a puzzle to solve — and as long as I’m caffeinated before solving it — I’m happy. Solve Today’s Capture
Puzzle of the WeekThis week, check out the Wednesday, June 10 crossword by David J. Kahn and Ethan Quigley, which has a really ambitious theme. In the constructor notes for this puzzle, David wrote: “Ethan Quigley, who co-authored this puzzle, is my grandson. Ethan’s a student at City Tech in New York City studying game design. He’s also a big soccer fan and plays in a recreational league. Needless to say, we got a big ‘kick’ out of working together on this one.” Read more about this puzzle in the Wordplay column.
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