Find the two palindromes described below. (A palindrome is a word or phrase that’s spelled the same backwards as forwards, such as Was it a bat I saw?) Question asked by a person afraid of rodents:
Ronald has a rare opportunity to meet the President of the United States. During his visit the president gives him a gift but tells Ronald he is never to sell it unless he sees the president again. Ronald consents, but the president dies later that year. Years later a man offers to buy the President’s gift for $1000. Ronald agrees and exchanges the gift for 20 crisp $50 bills. Did he keep his promise?
Yes. The president was Ulysses S. Grant, who died in 1885 and whose face has been on the $50 bill since 1913. He saw the president on the bills before he made the exchange.
Jim was canoeing on a lake when a sudden thunderstorm blew in tipped his boat. He swam to a rocky island about a mile from his family’s cottage and found a small, abandoned shack. Inside was an old kerosene lamp and a few matches. All the wood on the island was too damp to burn and the lamp was his only means of signaling for help but it only held an inch of kerosene, not enough to reach its short wick. How did he get the lamp burning to summon help?
Knowing kerosene and water wouldn’t mix and kerosene is less dense than water, he dipped the lamp in the lake and filled it with enough water so the kerosene rose to the top to cover the wick. The lamp was still burning an hour later when a motorboat rescued him.
Pair these words to make nine titles of books by Charles Dickens:
A LITTLE 1 RUDGE
B PICKWICK 2 COPPERFIELD
C EDWIN 3 TIMES
D BARNABY 4 CHUZZLEWIT
E NICHOLAS 5 PAPERS
F HARD 6 HOUSE
G BLEAK 7 DROOD
H DAVID 8 DORRIT
I MARTIN 9 NICKLEBY
A 8 = LITTLE DORRIT B 5 = PICKWICK PAPERS C 7 = EDWIN DROOD D 1 = BARNABY RUDGE E 9 = NICHOLAS NICKLEBY F 3 = HARD TIMES G 6 = BLEAK HOUSE H 2 = DAVID COPPERFIELD I 4 = MARTIN CHUZZLEWIT
I am a five-letter word and am feared by most but experienced by all. If you remove my first and last letters I bring life. If you add an ‘r’ between the third and fourth letters I am almost nothing and if you remove the first letter from this new word, I am your home.
Death (eat, dearth, earth). No one can escape death, but many fear it. Removing the first and last letters leaves eat, and we must eat to stay alive. Adding the ‘r’ turns death into dearth, which is scarcity and removing the first letter of dearth leaves earth, where you live, assuming this riddle hasn’t reached extraterrestrials.