From CubicDissection, L-Bert Hall, designed by Ronald Kint-Bruynseels for IPP27, in Cocobolo and Lacewood:

From Izumiya, Tamura's Six-Block Puzzle:

A Mozaika Ball, a Whipit Ball, and a racy Magic: 

Toll Gate card Number 1!    and a burr in a case: 

Several edgematching puzzles: 

Imported from China by CHH Games.

I have added a section on Ancient Puzzles, and Modern Puzzle Crazes.

We had a wonderful stay in Montreal, Canada. In between visits to some of Montreal's many and varied attractions, I managed to drop by several puzzle shops:

• Tour de Jeux (a chain) - Centre Eaton
• Le Quizz - 1500 Atwater Ave. Place Alexis-Nihon
• Boutique Strategie - 3423 rue Saint-Denis
• Franc Jeu (M. Guy Richer) - 4152 rue Saint-Denis
• Le Valet D'Coeur (had the best selection)

In addition to a booklet of solutions to many of Puzzle Master's tanglements (not pictured), here are some items I found:

Four well done puzzle challenges from Smart Games: 

Three of the latest puzzles from Philos: 

The Five Keys and Olymp puzzles from Constantin and the Bull's Nose from Eureka: 

A nice wooden Pigs in Clover, a Twist-'N-Slide 3D Truck, and a nameless but hefty nice pin puzzle in lucite: 

Scott T. Peterson made this beautiful copy of Stewart Coffin's new Involute design, in highly polished Padauk with Ebony corners.  

From Bits and Pieces:

I have added several new original designs on my Homemade Puzzles page. In addition to the 2 N's Cube No. 1, take a look at No. 2, No. 3, No. 4, and No. 5 (which might be my favorite).

From CubicDissection, RD001, Nested Burr Four, and Anderson's Delusion:

I have revised and much improved the section on Pentominoes and Other Polyforms.

Closterman 6x6x6 Caged Cubes, in Lyptus and Canarywood:

Three tanglements from Uncle's Puzzles, purchased at IQ Puzzles:

Visited Eureka on 6/17:

From CubicDissection, one of the second edition of the Stickman Chopstick Box: 

Try your hand at various mechanical puzzles that people have simulated online - open my new Virtual Mechanical Puzzle Compendium Box.

I have added a new page featuring a mapping among different classification schemes for mechanical puzzles.

I have also revised my books page.

Thanks to fellow puzzler Patty L. Smith, I learned that the wonderful Japanese online puzzle store Torito does in fact ship internationally and take PayPal orders. So I have several interesting items on the way to me:

From Norm Thompson, the first three puzzles in the Sacred Myths and Legends series, by Family Games: Da Vinci's Secret, The Equation, and The Legend of the King: 

I have re-vamped my links page and created a sorted list of over 200 Puzzle Vendors Around the World.

A trick lock engraved "MIOf[]" 

Scott T. Peterson is a talented craftsman from the state of Washington, who produces high-quality limited editions of puzzles in fine woods. He and I have been corresponding, and Scott will be making a few instances of my 2 N's Cube design. Scott has devised an attractive coloring scheme for the cube and made me the examples shown below - the first in Bocote and Yellowheart, and the second in Kingwood and Holly.

I would rate the 2 N's Cube of medium difficulty - it shouldn't take long for an experienced metagrobologist to solve it, but I think it presents a good challenge for the casual puzzler, particularly if one starts with it disassembled and hasn't seen the assembled arrangement. The design is the product of a search "by hand" (i.e. without a computer) for a selection of non-planar pieces formed from two n-tetrominoes each that would allow interlocking assembly into a 4x4x4 cube. My "theme" was the frequent mis-spelling of my last name, which has two n's. I was pleased to discover an arrangement that used four pairs of pieces - thusly again doubling the double-n theme - and yet assembled in a way that was not completely symmetric.

Scott's tolerances are so accurate that when I first received the cubes, I had trouble finding the disassembling moves! Naturally, wood tolerances vary with humidity, but Scott's pieces are very nicely made.

Made a weekend trip to Boston and visited both The Games People Play shop in Cambridge, and David Leschinsky's wonderful shop Eureka! in Brookline, Mass. Eureka has a fantastic selection of mechanical puzzles and is well worth a visit if you are in the Boston area. It is not far from downtown, out Beacon St. to the intersection with Harvard St. Eureka has a friendly, enthusiastic, and knowledgable staff who are willing to take the time to demonstrate puzzles, and help parents find suitable items for kids. Eureka also has a great hands-on attitude and provides open copies of many puzzles so you can try them out in the store. Here's what I found there:

The Games People Play had new Rubik's items, and also a stock of the KO Labyrinth in case you're looking for it - here is what I got there:

Trick Locks from wiredforfun:

The Tetris Cube, Tetris Ball, and Tetris Ball Twins, from Meffert's. These are actually made by IdeaOcean, where they're called the Idea Cube and Magic 16.

From the New York Puzzle Party:

A Split Star by Mark McCallum: 

Three WWII 1942 Slidem-Solitaire Puzzles: 

Four of the eight Karakuri Club 2006 Christmas Gifts:

Other Christmas gifts:

The Apple won an Honorable Mention in the IPP21 Design Competition.

John has graciously agreed to provide a 10% discount to all IPP members! Tell him Rob sent you.

An unexpected and wonderful Christmas present from Rocky Chiaro: one of four of his original plexiglass and brass Perplexity puzzles.

Many fascinating topics of potential interest to the mechanical puzzle afficionado, including:

Dissections Alignments Peg Solitaire Unicursal and Route-Finding Chessboard

Measuring River Crossing Solving Labyrinths and Mazes Misc. incl. Chinese Rings, Chain Links and Double-Dovetail Blocks

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