yes, it's the season of advent, but i've already started shopping for christmas. big mistake. as you may know, rubik's cube
is celebrating its 25th anniversary, so i just had to get one ... for duncan. it didn't last five minutes in the house before i had to rip it out of the box. of course, i didn't want anyone to actually touch it. "once we start messin with it, it'll be ruined," i warned. but the family didn't care. no, they insisted on jackin' it all up. which means that i have to figure it out if i want to have any hope of a perfect cube again, save buying a new one.
25 years ago, during the original craze, i could actually get two sides complete with a fair amount of a third side down, but that was 25 years ago and i can't for the life of me figure it out again. it's driving me nuts. but when i sat down to share my frustration with blogdom, something equally freaky struck me. it's been twenty-five years since the cube was launched into total fad-dom, winning "toy of the year" in 1980. 1980 was 25 years ago, my friends.
this means that we're 25 years older than when we first lost our minds trying to get all of the colors on that blasted cube correctly aligned. twenty five years seems like such a blasted long time. i mean, my toys are having anniversaries. that's insane. and don't try to pretend you didn't have one, too. it's estimated that over 100 million cubes were sold by the end of 1982 and almost every home in America had one, so i'll lay dollars to doughnuts you had one driving you insane, too. of course, if your house was anything like mine, your cube ended up in little bits.
still, i haven't given in to the temptation to rip the cube apart ... yet. mostly for fear i won't remember how i got the cube back together 25 years ago. i'm also a little paranoid that they've made it impossible to put back together. who "they" are i've no idea -- some anti-cheat toy police i suppose. i just can't bare the thought of having the family come home one day to find me jabbering incoherently on the kitchen floor and surrounded by multi-colored cube bits.
I just took off the little stickers on the face of each square and moved them to the right places.
Who cared that the edges didn't quite stick back down?
(Hands in pockets, walking away, whistling nonchalantly......)
I was one 25 years ago, but I remember having those around the house as I grew up. My older brother had one. I should get one for JJ. Thanks for the Christmas idea ;)
My husband solves this in no time flat. I hate him.