And Still Not Good At It!
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| Eleventh Hour by Goh Pit Khiam |
Once or twice a year, Tom Lensch emails out what he has been working on and lets
interested puzzlers place orders. A few weeks ago the email came in just as I
had purchased a few others and so my PayPal was tight and I also was aware that
if post brought me too much then Mrs S would
Whack! Ouch! me into oblivion…….again! I
resisted the urge to buy it all and just picked a couple that I figured might
just be possible for a man with my meagre bwain and which would not break the
bank or Mrs S’ patience. A week or so later I received the Eleventh Hour by
Goh Pit Khiam
(out of interest, I have seen the name as Goh Pit Khiam and Pit Khiam Goh – can
anyone tell me how it should be written?).
fine stamp on one of the pieces. 4 pieces to construct into a 4x4x4 cube –
surely, I must be able to manage this without too much difficulty after all
these years? I set to work last weekend and very quickly managed to see the
final position of all the pieces – yes, this might be an easy one! I was able
to assemble any 3 of them quite quickly into their correct places but always
was unable to get the 4th piece in. The way the pieces were interlocked always
ensured that one was completely blocked from getting past. This was nice and
fun – just the challenge I had been hoping for after desperately trying to
solve the 3rd in the
Hoffman suite
from Pelikan. Whilst I have your attention, there are still a few left of the
Sukiyaki, Steamboat and Fabrick puzzles on the
Pelikan store
– well worth a look.
on using this as an excuse for my feeble bwain failing on this puzzle for
several days. I was only able to play in the evenings but was getting nowhere
fast. I even emailed Tom to ask whether this was a TIC but was reassured that
it is “just” a simple interlocking puzzle. Damn! I’m rubbish at puzzles!
Finally on Friday evening, I assembled my cube with a sigh of relief and a
memory of the early days of my puzzling “career” – this simple interlocking
cube takes me back to the fabulous creations from
Rich Gain’s Microcubology. Over that first couple of years of PuzzleMad, I must have bought 15-20
gorgeous interlocking creations (they sit in a tray on display in my second
puzzle room – Whack! Ouch!). Only toward the
end did I buy them in the disassembled state and solve them that way. I had
kind of hoped that I might be better at them but Tom has proved me wrong!
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| 5 days to assemble – that’s rubbish! |
Goh Pit Khiam also designs some interesting packing puzzles which I usually
fail to manage but the Confound Space looked solvable by a mere human and I
couldn’t resist:
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| Confound space |
6 blocks to place in a box with a limited opening – this is usually impossible
for me.
Interestingly, I made a couple of discoveries very quickly and my “what if” sense made me try a few things and I was rewarded with my Aha! moment after just 20 minutes! Phew! I am not a complete eejit!
