“Life’s funny”, said an old friend when I bumped into him the other day. “Listen to this, I was born in March, yet I celebrate my birthday in August, and last February I married my mother”.
He was born in the month of August in a town named March, became a priest and married his widowed mother to her second husband in February (the month).
You want to go on an adventure to the remote city of Chenarz, but it’s 120 miles off the Pacific coast. To conserve money, take the smallest number of people as possible. Each person can carry enough food for five days but you can only travel 30 miles a day. You want to reach Chenarz, stay overnight, and return the next day. How many people, including yourself, must you take to reach the city?
You will need three other members in your party to accomplish your mission for a total of four people.
Four people × 5 day’s rations = 20 day’s rations.
Day 1: 5 rations – Four day’s rations are used. One person goes back using one day’s ration for the return trip. Day 2: 5 rations – Remaining three members use three day’s rations. One goes back using two day’s rations for the return trip. Day 3: 5 rations – Remaining two use two day’s rations. One goes back using three day’s rations for the return trip. Day 4: 1 ration – You use one day’s rations. You reach the city and stay the night. Day 5: 4 rations – You return to the coast using up four day’s rations.
Alfred and Bill are clerks at the local grocery store. Alfred can stock a shelf in 20 minutes, but Bill is new and takes 30 minutes. How long would it take for them to stock a shelf together?
Marla needs snacks for the students on her field trip. She bought 9 boxes of granola bars containing a total of 88 bars. She wanted variety, so she bought 3 different flavors, which happened to come from 3 different companies.
The Coconut Almond bars were packaged 8 to a box. The Chewy Chocolate Chip bars came 10 to a box. The Oats ‘n Honey package contained 12 per box.
She bought the most boxes of Coconut Almond but had the most Oats ‘n Honey bars.
You have fifty quarters on the table in front of you. You are blindfolded and cannot discern whether a coin is heads up or tails up by feeling it. You are told that x coins are heads up, where 0 < x < 50. You are asked to separate the coins into two piles in such a way that the number of heads up coins in both piles is the same at the end. You may flip any coin over as many times as you want.