Hand-Picked Links — January 10, 2025
Welcome back, friends. We’re talking beautiful jigsaw puzzles, delicious candy, fun videos for the whole family, coding challenges, and a quick Wordle-style geography game. Enjoy.
Parkside Puzzles
It was a sad (and confusing) day in 2023 when Four Point Puzzles announced they were going out of business. The design, packaging, and product were all fantastic. Our family loved building the Moon and the Earth. We bought a few more (including the entire set of The Planets) on clearance and didn’t think much more about it until late in 2024 when we were treated to a wonderful surprise as Four Point Puzzles rose from the dead, reincarnated as Parkside Puzzles.
Lindsay was kind enough to share the full behind-the-scenes story on the new site. If you’ve ever sold (or even purchased) anything online, you’ll probably be able to guess what happened. The popularity and success of Four Point led to an avalanche of ripoffs, and not just the designs — entire fake storefronts were created to trick people into believing they were purchasing from the her directly.
Thankfully after some much needed time off, Parkside née Four Point Puzzles is back and better than ever. Highly recommended for the puzzle enthusiast in your life.
Nerds Are Back
To be fair, Nerds (the candy) never went away. As a sour candy aficionado, I have many fond memories of tiny boxes of Nerds growing up and my personal favorite Dairy Queen blizzard of all-time, the Nerds Blizzard. Even after they stopped advertising it, you could still get it off-menu if you asked.
When Nerds Rope was introduced, it was a revelation. A nearly perfect combination of crunchy and chewy, plus the classic, mildly sour Nerds flavor. According to this New York Times article, the true breakthrough was Nerds Gummy Clusters. Revenue has skyrocketed as a result of this sublime confectionary combination. Good for them, I say. A well-deserved revenge of the Nerds.
Bonus pro tip: any hard, sour candy goes great with vanilla ice cream. Try the new freeze-dried Skittles.
The Kid Should See This
Surely you are already well-acquainted with the incredible resource for edutaining, beloved-by-people-of-all-ages videos, The Kid Should See This?
If not, there’s no better way to start than Rion’s list of the Top 10 Videos in 2024.
Check out this year’s number one video, -37F Winter in Yellowstone National Park by Drew Simms.
Advent of Code 2024
Is Advent over? Yes. Can you still complete the 2024 Advent of Code? Also yes. Go forth* and join the elite few who have conquered all 25 challenges. Once you’re done, celebrate with 10th anniversary Advent of Code merch on Cotton Bureau.
* That’s a programming language joke.
Travle
A daily puzzle for geography enthusiasts. Get from country to country via the shortest route. Much fun, minimal time investment. The ideal game.
That’s it for this week. Don’t forget to follow @cottonbureau.com on Bluesky for a good time.
