Flipper
Member
- Joined
- Jan 10, 2011
- Messages
- 1
I feel a bit like a prodigal son as I am returning to cubing after many years away.
I've been lurking a bit but as I have posted a couple of times I thought I should introduce myself.
I first started cubing in 1980. I bunked off school and went up to London and queued up to get a Rubik's Cube after seeing a news story about them arriving in the country.
Now I had a cube all I needed to do was to mix it up, solve it and bask in the plaudits of my peers. One Saturday a few short weeks later, well 6 to be exact, success (remember there was no internet, no algorithms, no easily available books and it didn't come with a solution in those days).
In solving it I had worked out some moves and I decided that I could use the solved cube to work out more (obviously after I had paraded my success to friends at school). Before I could put my plan into action my brother re-scrambled the cube as he said it kept me nice and quiet.
It took me another 2 weeks to solve it again and instead of the triumph of being the first to solve the cube at school I was the second. This turned out to be very fortunate as cubing was declared a nerdy thing to do by the cerebrally challenged and the first to solve it suffered at the hands of many a bully for having the temerity to display that not everybody in the world was a complete moron.
As a pogrom on cubers was declared at my secondary school cubing became a bit of a closet pastime. I stuck with it and managed to develop a way of solving it that allowed me to average 2m30s but the enforced solitary nature had taken a lot of the fun out of it, as being a bit vain I wanted someone to acknowledge that learning to solve the cube was an accomplishment rather than a waste of time (parents), a geeky trick(brother) or too dangerous to discuss (all my friends).
I continued to do the cube until the end of 1983 when the craze died down and returned to it briefly when the Revenge and then the Magic came out.
The puzzles were finally put away in 1988.
My love of puzzles continued and as this made for an easy Christmas or Birthday present I was well supplied, but I could never part with my Rubik's puzzles and much to my wife's chagrin they have moved with me from house to house for the last 23 years never seeing the light of day.
That was until a month ago. After being made redundant from a programming job myself and a friend decided to try our hand at developing an iPhone puzzle game.
When it went on sale in December a few reviewers mentioned the cube and I decided to have a look at the current cubing community and was amazed to discover the vibrant and supportive world that is cubing today.
This site has spurred me to get out my cubes and try again. Even though I would not have been able to describe the moves I developed the mechanical memory was still there when I got a cube in my hands although the order they should be done in was long gone.
I am therefore going to re-learn it, not to compete but just for the sheer fun and satisfaction it brings.
Thanks to everybody responsible for the SpeedSolving site (creators, moderators and members), I really wish it had been around when I was a teenager cubing in the 80's.
I've been lurking a bit but as I have posted a couple of times I thought I should introduce myself.
I first started cubing in 1980. I bunked off school and went up to London and queued up to get a Rubik's Cube after seeing a news story about them arriving in the country.
Now I had a cube all I needed to do was to mix it up, solve it and bask in the plaudits of my peers. One Saturday a few short weeks later, well 6 to be exact, success (remember there was no internet, no algorithms, no easily available books and it didn't come with a solution in those days).
In solving it I had worked out some moves and I decided that I could use the solved cube to work out more (obviously after I had paraded my success to friends at school). Before I could put my plan into action my brother re-scrambled the cube as he said it kept me nice and quiet.
It took me another 2 weeks to solve it again and instead of the triumph of being the first to solve the cube at school I was the second. This turned out to be very fortunate as cubing was declared a nerdy thing to do by the cerebrally challenged and the first to solve it suffered at the hands of many a bully for having the temerity to display that not everybody in the world was a complete moron.
As a pogrom on cubers was declared at my secondary school cubing became a bit of a closet pastime. I stuck with it and managed to develop a way of solving it that allowed me to average 2m30s but the enforced solitary nature had taken a lot of the fun out of it, as being a bit vain I wanted someone to acknowledge that learning to solve the cube was an accomplishment rather than a waste of time (parents), a geeky trick(brother) or too dangerous to discuss (all my friends).
I continued to do the cube until the end of 1983 when the craze died down and returned to it briefly when the Revenge and then the Magic came out.
The puzzles were finally put away in 1988.
My love of puzzles continued and as this made for an easy Christmas or Birthday present I was well supplied, but I could never part with my Rubik's puzzles and much to my wife's chagrin they have moved with me from house to house for the last 23 years never seeing the light of day.
That was until a month ago. After being made redundant from a programming job myself and a friend decided to try our hand at developing an iPhone puzzle game.
When it went on sale in December a few reviewers mentioned the cube and I decided to have a look at the current cubing community and was amazed to discover the vibrant and supportive world that is cubing today.
This site has spurred me to get out my cubes and try again. Even though I would not have been able to describe the moves I developed the mechanical memory was still there when I got a cube in my hands although the order they should be done in was long gone.
I am therefore going to re-learn it, not to compete but just for the sheer fun and satisfaction it brings.
Thanks to everybody responsible for the SpeedSolving site (creators, moderators and members), I really wish it had been around when I was a teenager cubing in the 80's.
