Bridges and Birthdays

This past week has been a very eventful one. I decided last Tuesday that I was going to build a bridge (this last line has been a great conversations starter). Anyways, last week I got into a deep conversation about the physics behind the building of brides, which turned into a conversation about contests where people build bridges and then compete with others to see how much weight their bridge can hold. You can look here to see one of those contests in action. Well, after a lot of thought and a trip to Michael's, I decided to build a bridge. My bridge, however, will not be participating in any contests due to the fact that it isn't being built for that purpose. I am going to build a bridge that is going to look awesome. Here, in fact, is a picture of what my bridge is going to look like:


The picture of the bridge that is drawn in red was the original idea, but as I got deeper into the construction and study of bridges I decided to go with something a little more intricate, and that is when I decided to go with the second drawing, which is in black. I was looking at different bridges online and decided that the London Bridge gave me the most inspiration. If you want to see what the London Bridge looks like, you can click here.

The next few pictures are different phases that I have gone through to get to where I am at. The first picture is showing what the table looked like right before I started working. You will see two pictures of different bridges in this picture, they were just to help me understand a little bit on how the columns were to be constructed.

Phase One: Columns

Phase 2: Connecting the columns 

Phase 3: Arch support

I know it doesn't look like much now, but this is only the beginning. This bridge is going to look amazing. If you noticed in the very first picture, the bridge that I am planning on building has a drawbridge. Well, I will have you know that my bridge will also have a working drawbridge. I just have to figure out how to build a cranking type system first. It is going to be cool. I'm pretty sure it is going to be my new coffee table ornament. 

Now, Like Zach mentioned in his latest post, here, it is was my Aunt Connie's birthday today. She was nice enough to invite me to her birthday party for cake and ice cream. I wish I could have gotten a picture of her, but I didn't. Fortunately, I didn't come home empty handed, because I got a snap shot of my Grandma wearing some pretty stylish sun glasses, as you can see here:

She is so hot right now!!

If you have any ideas on how I can build a crank system that would work on the "Parry Bridge" let me know. (I named it just now, if you have any better ideas for a name, I am open for suggestions.)