We’re feeling the heat in the Midwest this weekend. The last couple of days have been cresting 90F pretty easily making it tough for a lot of yardwork. I did get the mowing done yesterday and then went to the park mid-day to see if I could get a training run completed in the heat – the Bix7 is less than a weak away. Thanks to the leg rehab and quite frankly a very comfortable season up to this point, the heat acclamation has not been up to par this year and it is showing on the long runs. A week ago Linda and some friends of mine piled into the car and headed up for a Bix@6 training run. That was definitely rough and hoping that doesn’t repeat on race day. Fortunately, I made it through the run, but I admittedly did take a mile off the distance due to the fact the human coolant system went dry capping off my sweat production. When that happens, it’s best to cut your losses and head back. I ended up feeling the after effects of that until early this morning. Long story short(er), I’m just kicking back, taking it easy today and figured it was a great time to introduce a new category called “What Is This” or WIT for short. Every once in awhile something comes along that is odd or interesting from a creative or mechanical perspective. To make it interesting for you, I’ll provide a number of pictures or clues in a blog post to help you figure it out. The answer will then be posted at the end of the NEXT blog entry. Are you up for the challenge?
The first WIT challenge is this:
First some details that may or may not help you. This was found in the basement of Linda’s mother’s house while we were clearing it in order to fix some foundation problems she was having. It was just thrown in a pile of miscellaneous stuff and immediately fascinated me for a couple of reasons. One it looked complex and intricately designed. The other cool feature is there was a gear on the other side that rotated the rounded triangles in a unique pattern. It took a few days to figure out what it was (big thanks to Linda having some recollection in the distant past on what it was). As a hint, it is not really a toy, nor is it a working part for anything in the house … well, at least nothing in a typical house. It is also not an American design. There is one reader of this blog that might already know what it is, but the rest of you might want to check out the detailed assembly pictures that follow after the jump.
