Columnist Sandy Thompson: Blame it on someone else, then sue

Sandy Thompson

Friday, June 7, 2002 | 5:16 a.m.

THIS IS SERVING NOTICE on The New York Times and Ravensburger Puzzles that I intend to sue them.

I am an addict, and it's their fault. I am addicted to The New York Times Sunday crossword puzzles (forget those puny daily puzzles -- I go straight for the hard stuff). I also was addicted to Ravensburger jigsaw puzzles (not the simple 500-piece ones but the 1,500 to 5,000 ones). Although I have not done a jigsaw puzzle in a while, I still suffer from the painful effects of when I did.

The addictions have cost me lost time with my family and serious neck and back pain. Neither The New York Times nor the jigsaw manufacturers revealed the ill effects their products can cause. None of their products carry warning labels. The bookstores that sell Sunday crossword books and the game stores with the jigsaw puzzles must share the blame; they failed to post warnings on their shelves.

You can sit at a table and put together the outer edges of a 5,000-piece jigsaw puzzle. But you must stand and bend over to put together the middle pieces. Doing that for three or four hours causes back and neck pain, plus stiff joints.

Lying in bed on your stomach, squinting to see the small print of the Sunday crossword puzzle books, also causes neck and back pain.

The New York Times and Ravensburger must pay for my suffering. I never intended to spend hours doing crosswords and puzzles, but now I can't stop. Although I have not lost a day's pay from the job because of these addictions, there were times I went to work exhausted because of the late nights spent poring over crosswords and wracking my brain for the correct answers. That surely affected my work performance.

I neglected cooking dinner for my family some nights and doing daily household chores because I just had to fit "one more piece" into the puzzle. Just one more. So my family suffered, too, and they should be compensated.

I also should be compensated for loss of potential income. The time spent on crosswords and jigsaws could have been used to write at least three best-selling novels.

Attorneys would be standing in line to take my case if they weren't so busy pursuing other ridiculous claims:

At what point does common sense come into play here? Why should a responsible majority be deprived of something that an irresponsible minority can't handle? If we, as individuals, do anything to excess, whose fault is it? Our own!

Wait a minute. Maybe it's not entirely our fault. Attorneys are partly to blame. Just as there is an excess of alcohol, gaming, fast food and guns in this country, there are too many lawyers.

Forget The New York Times and Ravensburger. I'm going to sue all those money-hungry lawyers who prey on gullible people who can't take responsibility for their own actions and excesses.

Now all I have to do is find an attorney willing to take the case.