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Tim has many friends around the world who share his passion for collecting physics toys and unusual gadgets and gizmos. Tim shares items he has found and in return people send him items in return.

He recently received a parcel from one of his friends, Ray Hall in the USA. Ray is a professor of physics at Fresno State University in California. And here is what was inside the parcel!

A balancing bird that balances on his tail, and has many degrees of movement. The wings are quite large, so they should pick up the slightest breeze, and allow the bird to gently ride the thermals!

An intriguing puzzle, with small cubes that assemble into larger shapes. Each small cube has tiny neodymium magnets inside, which are small spheres, so they can automatically orientate, so that any two cubes will always be attracted to each other. A deck of cards shows a shape for you to make, and each card also has an indication of the difficulty of that particular task.

Next, a pencil from Saguaro National Park in Arizona. The park gets its name from the saguaro, a large cactus that is native to the Sonoran Desert and that does not grow naturally elsewhere. The pencil is in the characteristic shape of the cactus!

Tangram Vol 4 comes from https://www.artofplay.com/ and explores the concept of light.

Finally a mug with a mirror surface on the outside. This allows you to view an anamorphic image that is present on the saucer. However something strange is happening here. There are flowers on the saucer, which appear in the reflected image on the mug. However when you look at the mug, a butterfly has appeared from somewhere. How did that happen? The answer is that there are ridges on the saucer, and the images of the flowers appears on the side of the ridges that face outwards. The inner faces of the ridges face towards the mug, and that is where the anamorphic image of the butterfly is hidden... but revealed when you look at the mug! Very ingenious.