MPP XXXXCIIIIV

Another solo MPP with no residential visitors and by the time I’ve stopped at the shops to grab the drinks and milk, there are already a couple of familiar faces inside the hall and the chairs and tables are already neatly laid out – Steve and Phil have done an excellent job under Mike’s no-doubt strict oversight - thanks chaps!

We grab the gear and grub out the car and get the kitchen set up and the puzzles laid out: I’ve brought along a tub of 3D printed bits for Derek’s balls – aka Mr Bosch’s sphere assemblies - in various sizes for folks to have a bash at. There’s also a few new Karakuri acquisitions and a bunch of Bennos that have just arrived…and I can’t resist taking along Minima XIII just in case anyone hasn’t had a play with that one yet. 

Ali and the girls arrive and they set up camp at the back of the hall where they proceed to amuse themselves pretty much the entire day, inexplicably without any puzzles!  

Robin arrives with a bit of a fanfare, and a couple of huge 3D printed balls which he is duly goaded into rolling the length of the hall to see if they’ll spontaneously disassemble – they remain intact so some subsequent disassembly is required.

Knowing that I’d missed out on the Karakuri Skull from the recent update, Fraser’s brought along his copy for me to have a play with and I have a grand old time fiddling with it – the theming is lovely and it’s a fun solve – this looks like a promising start for newcomer hakuu!

Fraser’d also brought along a copy of the rather nutty musical cube – where each face has whistles with a common pitch – so in order to solve the cube you’re obliged to whistle a convoluted cacophony along the way – several folks admired it during the day but I don’t remember hearing anyone trying to solve or scramble it…

Ethel arrives with several large crates full of puzzles that we help her set out for the assembled puzzle-gannets to rifle through. She’s brought a shopping bag along for me with a bunch of things she’s agreed to sell me. Pretty much everyone has a rake through the crates and most end up taking a few things off her… and in spite of already having a bag-full, I have a rifle and end up with one of Gary’s impossible objects and a pair of jars with Hanayama’s assembled inside of them – one of which will replace one of my Japanese exchange puzzles that didn’t quite manage to get home in one piece (so I have a doubly impossible broken jar with a Cast Vortex inside of it that still won’t come out, either through the top of the jar or the hole in the side of it!).

Fraser and Steve had independently brought along a large pile of the Hayduck’s Decorative puzzles and several of those got a good playing with. They are beautifully made and have such luxurious and tactiles pieces that it’s easy not to think of them as jigsaw puzzles.

We descend on the village, and several pig rolls, a few kebabs and a vegan wrap are duly acquired and scarfed back at the hall. (No vegans knowingly harmed in the process – promise!)

Steve had brought along his copy of Juno’s Snub Star for the experts to assemble and thoughtfully not brought the instructions… there was an initial inspection of the (60!) pieces before they abandoned the idea until I’d managed to make a trip home to collect my set of instructions – when those duly arrived Chris and Dan appointed themselves chief assembleators with Steve supplying (sometimes) the right pieces for them. 

Things started in a fairly amusing manner with the assembleators furiously shunning external aids like masking tape to hold pieces in situ – resulting in some rather amusing pictures of Dan inserting bits while Chris attempted to hold things together. Once they got past that it was fairly plan sailing with only a few bits of back-tracking when bits hadn’t been inserted in the correct direction or in quite the right holes – they were pretty proud of their work when the key piece finally went in… and I suspect that Steve was mighty grateful!

Several folks spend a while assembling various incarnations of Derek’s Balls – some masking tape is sacrificed in order to retain some element of puzzler sanity – perhaps I should have brought more masking tape – time will tell… at least a few sets of nested balls and one or two singles end up going into the wild and I still have a few spares to take along to King’s Day next weekend.

I get to spend a while playing with Chris’ copy of Idan’s I Need My Lunch and get almost nowhere… I manage to remove one bit, but can’t get it to release any more of its secrets. While I’m fiddling with it, I am able to notice one or two absolutely fantastic bits of machining – you know the sort of thing where you wonder something to yourself and then notice that that thing will in fact do that rather unusual thing you’ve imagined it might be able to… this one is clearly an absolute ripper and I’m going to need to get myself a copy – even if that means it ends up kicking my ass for an age (or three!).

Almost everyone heads back up to Puzzling Times Central where the hounds are glad to see old friends and new shoes. Most people dig into the puzzle cave and come out with something interesting, some end up chatting in the kitchen and everyone seems to be having a fine old time.

I decide it’s time for a major break with tradition(!) and order a pizza delivery instead of heading down to the chippy for fish suppers… there doesn’t seem to be much disappointment and there’s not a huge amount of pizza left (especially after we manage to convince someone to take the last half a pizza home with them at the end of the night).

One of our smaller MPPs, but definitely another excellent day with my puzzling friends – thank you all!

 

Jammed Gem Again 3D

A few weeks ago Tye sent me an advance copy of Jammed Gem Again – a new production of Frederic Boucher’s 2024 Jury Honourable Mention award-winning design now being made by Joshua Clouser.

I didn’t get to play with it in the Design Competition (too busy chatting with my puzzling friends from around the world!) so I was chuffed to be able to have a go at it in the calm surroundings of my study. The family resemblance is clear: there’s a box with pieces inside it based on a 2*2*3 internal space. Some of the pieces are visible through holes in the side, but they don’t really seem to be able to move much at all… which is interesting. You’re also aware that this is probably going to be a little more than just a “pack the pieces in the box” or “get the pieces out the box” puzzle, given that you’re being asked to find a few gems, your number and a secret message… and the magical phrase “sequential discovery” has also been noted somewhere in the description – all of which, coupled with the designer’s name, should be more than enough to pique any puzzler-worth-their-salt’s interest.

Mine certainly was, so I dived in soon after it arrived. It has a pleasing heft to it – it feels like it’s probably not going to succumb to some enthusiastic puzzlers’ ham-fisted attempts at doing the wrong things… which is a very good thing as I can be quite ham-fisted! An initial inspection shows up a couple of things that are sure to be interesting at some point, but are more or less impossible to use at this stage…

A little more investigation and I managed to unlock a couple of tools that immediately felt really helpful… and I really enjoyed playing with them all over the place, but sadly my progress ended up being somewhat blocked… and it remained thusly blocked for more than a week – and not because I wasn’t trying to make progress! I ended up running through my full gamut of “let me try this”s and “I wonder if there’s a that” – and when they didn’t work, I tried them all again, this time with more enthusiasm… the puzzle held firm and I was still blocked.

And I stayed blocked until a kindly Tye asked how I was doing and what I thought, so I told him what I’d done and I could sense the disappointment in his response – he told me he was surprised I hadn’t made another discovery yet… so while I explained that I’d tried moving everything that I could get to and to prove my point I ran around them all one more time, only to find something different happening… which was particularly galling as I know I’d tried that exact thing many times already and it hadn’t given me anything… turned out I hadn’t – I’d missed a spot, so to speak.

Armed with a new and intriguing tool I knew exactly what I wanted to do and with a bit of a fiddle I began to grow my little pile of bits and pieces deep from within this puzzle.

At one point I really began to fear that I’d never find homes for all of these little things that I’d freed… but I needn’t have worried – it’s all very logical and the reset manages to bypass a lot of the fiddliest bits. (Thank you Frederic!)

When you get all the way to the end there’s a heartfelt tribute to one of the giants – a lovely touch.

I’m so glad that Tye goaded me into trying harder – solving that has been the highlight of my Easter weekend – it’s instantly become a favourite!

Great design by Frederic – with some VERY clever tools – very nicely executed by Joshua… and if you’re tempted, Tye has them available for pre-order over here at time of writing. 

Pocket Change – Green

I’m very lucky to have some rather generous puzzling friends. Ali had recently spotted a new Puzzled-by-Piker Pocket Change puzzle had come out so he bought an extra copy for me – cheers mate!

The Green is another eminently pocketable puzzle where the aim is immediately obvious: on the underside there’s a slidey-tray with a coin captured in it – so free the coin! That slider carries the coin backwards and forwards, but there’s no obvious way for the coin to come out… good start!

On the top of the puzzle, there’s some interesting looking things to play with: a knob in the centre will rotate and there seem to be a few ball bearings in a slot on the one side, while the slot on the other side appears well-devoid of ball bearings.

Manipulating these things seem to allow you to move the balls from one side to the other, and sometimes that almost appears to be helpful in your quest… but somehow it’s never quite enough… some Think (c) required.

…OK some more Think (c) – and indeed some more discoveries necessary and then you’re able to neatly remove the coin from its hiding place.

Another great addition to the canon – perfectly safe to carry in your pocket – you’re never going to unintentionally lose anything.

Thanks Ali!