The Best of Buff is a collection of rope tricks – most without the use of gimmicks or special rope preparation. The effects that I thought were particularly interesting and largely unknown are as follows.
The Pretzel Knot – Buff suggests you create the pretzel knot on the knee. This results in an easier and tighter tie.
Mustache Rope Cut – A way of cutting a once cut rope again (seemingly in four pieces) to restore the rope to its full length.
A Ladies Influence – Tying two ropes together side by side with a slip knot. A man tests two ends of the rope and shows that the knot is tight. A woman easily pulls the other two ends of the rope and the knot melts away. This can be used as a test of strength with a dad and a young child. As a lead in to a Grandma’s Necklace effect this would be excellent. The Encyclopedia of Rope Tricks has an entire chapter on rope tricks using multiple ropes. It is easy enough to use standard methods to tie the slip knot. The slip knot given for use with the trick is unnecessarily complicated and unnatural in my opinion.
A Sliding Knot Sequence – Using a slip knot tied using the Hunter Puzzle Knot as an easy method to gain slack for a sliding knot effect. The slack is obtained easily as the left hand is in perfect position to grab some slack.
Thumb Penetration – An impromptu thumb penetration that I had not seen before.
I was very happy with this booklet. It contains a lot of useful stuff. The patter was dated and probably would be considered crude by today’s standards but describing the rope as a solar clothes drier is a good line in this era of carbon neutrality. 5 stars.
