Rubik

...my eye a spotted the Rubik Cube. I remembered having one as a child and really enjoyed it. I offered to go halves with my son on it as he was interested and I thought it would be educational (actually I wanted it), so we did. Anyway at £12.99 I thought it was a tad expensive (well it was a high class garden centre), but hey, he had loads of money for his birthday burning a hole in his pocket, much more than me anyway.


I couldn`t ...
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Rubik Cube.
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Anyway, what is it? I remember having one in the 80`s, in fact I had several. It was the craze at the time. I think it was around 1980 invented by a man of the same name. I had at least one full sized one, and several mini ones on keyrings. A bit later they invented one called the revenge with an extra layer (12 pieces on each side instead of 9). Revenge it was and a complete ... more

I was out browsing the shops the other day with my 8 year old son. He was wanting to spend some of his birthday money so we were looking around toy departments. Actually, we were in a garden centre but it had a good toy section so that saved going too far. Out of the corner of my eye a spotted the Rubik Cube. I remembered having one as a child and really enjoyed it. I offered to go halves with my son on it as he was interested and I thought it would be educational (actually I wanted it), so we did. Anyway at £12.99 I thought it was a tad expensive (well it was a high class garden centre), but hey, he had loads of money for his birthday burning a hole in his pocket, much more than me anyway.

I couldn`t wait to get it home and have a go. I let my son have the first go. He quickly became bored which left me more time to play. He did spent a fair amount of time on it, but like a lot of children, if you can`t achieve something straight away,it is not worth persevering. Hopefully he will become interested a bit later.

Rubik Cube.
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Anyway, what is it? I remember having one in the 80`s, in fact I had several. It was the craze at the time. I think it was around 1980 invented by a man of the same name. I had at least one full sized one, and several mini ones on keyrings. A bit later they invented one called the revenge with an extra layer (12 pieces on each side instead of 9). Revenge it was and a complete waste of time because it was completely impossible.

The original cube is a cube (you don`t say) with 6 colours, one on each side. The colours are blue, green, red, yellow, white and orange. Each side has 9 little squares and the cube can be muddled by turning a section with 3 pieces at a time and then solved again. It doesn`t take long to muddle it up, it takes slightly longer to solve it again.

Entertainment Value.
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The cube is certainly entertaining. It is not as popular in this day and age with all the electronic toys, but back then it was. It is simple (did I say simple?), the idea is simple, but it can keep people occupied for hours. When it was very popular it was a great talking point, nearly everybody had one and completing the cube could become very competitive. In my family, my mum and sister just were not interested. My dad and I used to have competitions. He used to throw it to me and instruct me to do the white side and time me or the blue side. We could both complete the whole cube, though not straight away. I would just do one side, then two, then 3. Eventually if you keep going, you will find that you have completed the whole cube. OK, so for me, it may not have been strictly strategic, but at least I could do it. There were lots at my school who couldn`t. The craze seemed to last a long time, though I can`t remember how long.

Cheating.
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Back then cheating was more simple than it is now, though in my opinion there is no point in cheating as there is not challenge then. Some people at my school used to take the stickers off and stick them back on again. Not the best idea as they wouldn`t stick on very well again, not that I ever did it. Funnily enough, it was one of the first things that my son suggested. NO NO NO NO NO! You can also take the cube apart and put it back together again. Yes, I did do this on occassion. This was a puzzle in itself though, putting it back togerher again. Not the intended one though but it can be boring sticking to the rules.

These days the cheating is a lot more sophisticated, you can go on line and look for solutions. There are videos showing you how to complete the cube as well as various other solutions. I don`t see the point in this either, it is a bit like cheats on computer games, why, isn`t solving it suposed to be the fun? There are also books on the subject aswell.

Cube Solvers.
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There are all sorts of people on line who can solve the cube really quickly. They do it with their hands and move so quickly, I can hardly move it that quickly, let alone think and plan my moves. How do they do it? Even more bizzare are people who can do it with their feet. Very clever I think but why? For those who don`t have use of their hands than yes, excellent. But for those who do then why show off?

Can I do it now?
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I managed to do it in a few days. Not a world record but I was pleased. I don`t tend to complete ANY sorts of puzzles and it is a well known fact that you need to exercise your brain to keep it active, so I was pleased that I could still do it. I am certainly not as good as I used to be though. When I completed the cube, my son was in bed, he will be sooo proud of me I thought. Actually, I am the reason he became fed up. I should have left him to it. In the begining when I could easily and quickly do, one, two and three sides, he began to think there was no point as he was not as good as me. He is much better at computer games though. The truth is, I just don`t think he is really interested. Anyway I did the cube.

Could I put it down and leave it? No. I remember a little trick that we all used to perform when we were younger. From what I could remember, you would turn one section, then turn the cube around, turn another section, turn the cube around, turn another section, turn the cube around and so on and on and on. This would mess the cube up well and truely but if you kept turning, it would eventually become complete again. I thought I would be cocky and do this. Unfortunately I must have either forgotten how to do it, or turned too much or missed a turn or something, you`ve guessed it, it stayed messed up.

I haven`t solved it again, but I am kind of bored with it now.

Do I recommend?
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It was good for a bit of fun and I was itching to see if I could still do it. I paid a bit over the odds for mine, they are around £10 usually. They do provide entertainment. I think for someone who has had one in the past like me, it is great, but I would say a 5 minute wonder but it took me a bit longer that that. It is not a lasting thing I don`t think. For people competing against each other, it would be good fun though, for a while.

The youth of today may not be as interested as in the 80`s as there are a lot more intersting electronic toys available.

It is educational though and helps people to think and use their brain to solve puzzles which is good and should be encouraged. I am going to have a go again in a minute. With regards to my son, I am not going to push him to use it, but when he is a bit older I will get it out again and see if he wants a go. It is also very good for manual dexterity.

There are probably many of you out there who are better than me at the cube, I am just happy that I can do it and my husband can`t. 

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