Useless Inventions and Random Fangirling

“A monkey glances up and sees a banana, and that's as far as he looks. A visionary looks up and sees the moon.” Victor said.

Conor smirked, “Which resembles a giant banana” ~ Airman.

In my latest Dusty Red post (part 11), I mentioned that I'd recently finished reading Airman by Eoin Colfer. Here is the promised post, including one or two random bits and pieces. But first, the cover of the book and the synopsis...

"Conor Broekhart was born to fly. Or, more accurately, he was born flying. Little wonder he became what he became. In an age of discovery and invention, many dreamed of flying, but for Conor, flight was more than just a dream, it was his destiny. 

In one dark night on the island of Great Saltee, a cruel and cunning betrayal destroyed his life and stole his future. Now Conor must win the race for flight, to save his family and to right a terrible wrong..."

Doesn't it sound cool? And I reckon the cover's interesting too. You (yes that means you) should really read this book, it's great book. And now to tell you about the invention.

I decided that making a flying machine would be too difficult so I decided to try something else....a "Mysterious winged 'A'", as it is called in the book. See the big 'A' thingy in the picture? Not the one at the beginning of the word 'Airman' but the 'A' above the 'M'. That's what I made. Using tie wire, paper, scissors, glue, pliers and (of course) myself.

First I used the pliers and my fingers to bend the wire into an A shape (extremely difficult). I'd aimed to make the A slightly bigger than it is in real life on the cover of the book, but that kind of failed as I hadn't cut myself a big enough piece of wire so the 'wings' of the A were...not so good (or long) to put it lightly.

For my second attempt (I was very committed to this) I got a nice long bit of wire and also decided to make the A smaller. I'd made the top corner and one side, but when I went to do the other side I squeezed the wire a little too hard and it snapped. Typical.

Then I used what was previously going to be a 'wing' and tried again. Attempt number 3. This time I was very careful not to snap the wire. And after a lot of twisting, bending, muttering and hoping, I did it! And it actually didn't look too bad.

But that was only the first part.

I then printed out an A like in the picture above and used the scissors to cut it out. Then I used bucket loads of glue (perhaps that's a slight exaggeration, but I did use more than I needed too) and glued the paper to the wire. After that I accidentally shoved the 2nd attempt other bit of leftover wire up my thumbnail (not a smart move), and so I decided to go inside and wash all the blood off my finger.

So that's how I made the random-and-completely-useless-but-cool invention (sadly I have no photos, but you can trust me. It looks cool.). I'm not entirely sure what to do with it now...but it was fun making it. I think I'm currently getting just a little obsessed with Airman. Oh well, who cares?

I think I may have run out of things to say, but I'll conclude with several quotes and adding one last time, "You should seriously read this book!" And if you find the quotes slightly confusing go read the book and you will understand everything.

“Don’t feel bad; I regularly reduce people to unintelligible stammers.” ~ Victor Vingy

“Conor, I could search the world for another swashbuckling scientist, but I doubt if I would find one like you.” ~ Isabella

“Other men look up and down, left and right; but men like us are different. We are visionaries.” ~ Linus Wynter

~ Jane, Misty Maiden