Beam, Shine and Sparkle White

I beam, shine and sparkle white,
I brighten the day with a single light.
I charm and enchant one and all,
I can counter the darkest pall.

What am I?

A smile.

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Sounds Nothing Like the Word

When pronounced, it sounds nothing like the word.

A sentence.

By Sef Daystrom

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What Runs Around the Yard

What runs around the yard without moving?

A fence.

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Horse Fence

Farmer Finnegan needs to build a fence to keep his horses on his property. He only has a little over 1.5 miles of fence materials, but there’s also a mile-long straight river running through his property. What shape should he use for the fenced in area to give his horses the most space possible?

Our dear friend Finnegan should build a half-circle fence with the river as the diameter, giving the horses about 0.4 square miles to frolic and play in.

Area of semi-circle = πr2 / 2 = π × .5 miles2 / 2 = 0.3927

Posted in Brain Teasers

Four Times Every Week

What happens four times in every week, twice in every month and once in a year?

The letter ‘e’. There are four ‘e’s in ‘every week’, two ‘e’s in ‘every month’ and one ‘e’ in ‘year’.

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Not Want to Have But Not Want to Lose

What do you not want to have and not want to lose?

A lawsuit.

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Wolves and Owls

You are in the woods with owls and wolves. There are 22 eyes and 32 legs. How many owls and wolves are there?

5 owls and 5 wolves, (not 6 owls because 2 of the eyes and legs are yours).

2 * owls + 2 * wolves = 20 eyes
2 * owls + 4 * wolves = 30 legs
owls + wolves = 10 eyes → owls = 10 – wolves
owls + 2 * wolves = 15 → 10 – wolves + 2 * wolves = 15 → wolves = 5
owls + 5 = 10 → owls = 5

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A Most Unusual Paragraph

This is a most unusual paragraph. How quickly can you find out what is so unusual about it? It looks so ordinary you’d think nothing was wrong with it – and in fact, nothing is wrong with it. It is unusual though. Why? Study it, think about it, and you may find out. Try to do it without coaching. If you work at it for a bit it will dawn on you. So jump to it and try your skill at figuring it out. Good luck! Don’t blow your cool!

The most common letter in the English language, the letter e, is not found in the entire paragraph.

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The Truck and the Plane

A delivery truck from the post office is sent to the airport to meet a cargo plane at its planned arrival time. The plane lands ahead of schedule and its contents are brought toward the post office by bicycle. After a half hour, the bicycle meets the truck and the mail is transferred.

The truck returns from the post office 20 minutes early. How early did the plane arrive? (Assume all transactions are instantaneous)

The delivery truck arrived back 20 minutes early, so it would have taken 20 minutes to go from where it met the bicycle to get to the airport and back. Therefore, the bicycle and truck met when the truck was 10 minutes from the airport. Adding those 10 minutes to the 30 minutes the truck had already driven to meet the bicycle means the plane arrived 40 minutes ahead of schedule.

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Grow In Trees and Have No Teeth

I grow in trees, eat living things but have no teeth and give birth to something that looks nothing like me. What am I?

A bird. They are hatched and raised in trees (nests), don’t have teeth in the traditional meaning of teeth and they lay eggs, which look nothing like a bird.

A butterfly / caterpillar could also work.

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