"The cat... quickly got bored of it and meowed to be let out."

November 20, 2009 4:42 PM

From Matthias Wandel, the inventor of the wooden marble calculator and the non-wooden eyeballing game, now comes the wooden Jenga pistol and its successor, as well as the wooden geodesic cat storage device and wooden wasp sucker.
posted by Blazecock Pileon (18 comments total)

Favorited! Like! Faved! Has Favorites!
posted by mhjb at 4:46 PM on November 20, 2009

This guy is, like, our Leonardo da Vinci or something.
posted by Sys Rq at 4:56 PM on November 20, 2009

So cool.

Scroll down to the end of the wooden wasp sucker page and there's a photo of a full day's catch. Eep!
posted by cobwebberies at 5:21 PM on November 20, 2009 [1 favorite]

That's a lot of wasps. Heebies + jeebies to the max.
posted by Mister Cheese at 5:26 PM on November 20, 2009 [2 favorites]

And I say that as a man who's been elbow deep in recalcitrant bees. Ain't natural having that many wasps in one place. Though I can respect the need to be able to see how many you've caught. He should make a spider sucker. A box full of wolf spiders, that would be crowd pleaser.
posted by Mister Cheese at 5:36 PM on November 20, 2009

His main site which has cool projects somewhat weekly.
posted by DU at 6:01 PM on November 20, 2009 [1 favorite]

Some of my best memories from first year undergrad were made possible by his maps and descriptions. And thanks to his exploration by airplane, I've gotten to hike through meter-high grass along a former rail line to get to a huge abandoned railway bridge up high in the middle of nowhere.

The other stuff looks pretty cool too.
posted by parudox at 6:14 PM on November 20, 2009 [1 favorite]

Mmmmm - excellent combination of a great mind and great woodworking tools. Very nice.
posted by Salvor Hardin at 6:40 PM on November 20, 2009

In the future, criminal cats will be stored for eternity in the Wooden Geosphere.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 6:52 PM on November 20, 2009 [1 favorite]

I like his little wooden tracked vehicle.
posted by hattifattener at 6:54 PM on November 20, 2009

In fairness, wasps only build nests inside your building because their previous natural habitat was bulldozed into fucking oblivion.
posted by turgid dahlia at 7:08 PM on November 20, 2009

The problem with the world is certainly not enough wooden geodesic cat storage devices.
posted by qvantamon at 7:31 PM on November 20, 2009 [1 favorite]

I have a pretty good idea how this person got his cat wedged into a wooden geodesic ball, and why.
posted by spacewrench at 7:35 PM on November 20, 2009 [1 favorite]

I am inspired. For reals. This weekend I will go forth and be all the engineer I can be.
posted by water bear at 8:21 PM on November 20, 2009

This guy is a legend, I've been reading various pages of his for years. I love his wooden pipe organ.
posted by RustyBrooks at 9:40 PM on November 20, 2009

I have the capacity and tendency, to become obsessed with the mathematics of things like geodesic balls. It can be fun. It can also hurt. I like this post.
posted by Goofyy at 11:15 PM on November 21, 2009

I live with an engineer who, if he built a geodesic sphere, would totally think "Man! I'm going to put my cat in there!"

I don't know if I'm comforted or terrified to know that he's not alone.
posted by grapefruitmoon at 5:33 AM on November 22, 2009

This guys jigs are awesome. I really like his horizontal boring jig.
posted by butterstick at 9:44 AM on November 23, 2009