Puzzling Behavior

Flamingo Lake RV Resort
Jacksonville, FL

I just took four Advil. That’s no surprise. I am a classic overindulger. If two will make my back feel better, just imagine how much faster and how much more effective four will be.

I have my son to blame for this backache. He gave me a thousand-piece jigsaw puzzle for Christmas, which I have been bending over for four hours straight. John quit sorting at about 45 minutes. He’s much more of an immediate gratification type and I guess the task I had assigned him – finding edges – was not doing it for him.

The weather here in Jacksonville is gorgeous. It hit a high of 81 today, but a dry and breezy 81, so I was lured outside with my puzzle and the new felt roll-up puzzle-saver I just bought.

I labored on creating my border for most of the afternoon, stopping only when I realized I could put the stripey building together in short order. Immediate gratification. I’m not immune.

The whole time I thought I was doing a San Francisco skyline, but when I consulted the box, it turned out to be New York. What’s with these puzzle makers? They take every pretty building in a city and squoosh them all together next to the waterfront and you’re supposed to recognize your home city?

Last time I looked the UN wasn’t pink. Nobody was fishing in the East River. Trolling for bodies, maybe, but not for something you might possibly eat. And I defy anyone to photograph Lincoln Center from the Brooklyn Bridge. It’s on the other side of town, guys!

When you can’t recognize the city you worked in, played in, loved and hated your whole adult life, that’s not a picture of your city. It’s a nice picture, a colorful picture, and a fun puzzle to do. It’s just not my city.

All of which is why, having blown an entire afternoon trying to get started, I’m still not finished with the border. I do have the stripey building, but god knows where that goes. (Or where it is in Manhattan, for that matter.) For now it’s in the middle.

At five, I called it a day and rolled up my green felt cloth, stuffed it into the tube that was in the box, then read the directions and realized I should have rolled the puzzle up with the tube inside the felt to keep the pieces in place.

So it looks like I’ll be doing the border over the next time I take my puzzle out to spend a lovely day in the out of doors, with the sun and the breeze and a Diet Coke and nothing but nothing else to do but have fun. Ah well.