An Iron Horse With A Flaxen Tail

An iron horse with a flaxen tail.
The faster the horse runs,
The shorter his tail becomes.

What is it?

A needle and thread.

Posted in Riddles

The Letters of Man

Using only the letters in MAN to fill in the blanks, make normal, uncapitalized words.

1. _ _ O _ G
2. R _ _ D O _
3. _ _ R I _ _
4. E _ P _ _ _ D _
5. C I _ _ _ _ O _
6. P _ _ O R _ _ _
7. _ _ I _ L _ _ D
8. _ R _ _ _ E _ T

1. AMONG
2. RANDOM
3. MARINA
4. EMPANADA
5. CINNAMON
6. PANORAMA
7. MAINLAND
8. ARMAMENT

Posted in Brain Teasers

I Tell You When to Start

I tell you when to start,
Or remind if you forget.

I smash others to break them apart,
But I’m pushed by another of me.

What am I?

Cue. A cue tells you when to start, or if you forget your lines in a play. A cue ball is used to break at the beginning of a game of pool and the cue stick is used to push the cue ball on the break.

Another interesting tidbit is that cue is how you spell the letter q if you’re writing it out.

Posted in Riddles
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I Belong To Everyone

I belong to everyone. Sometimes I make you happy, sometimes I make you sad. I will never end until the day you do.

Your thoughts.

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I Am Pronounced As One Letter But Written As Three

I am pronounced as one letter but written as three,
There are two of me, I am single, I am double,
I can be blue, brown, black or green.
I can be read from right to left or left to right and am still the same.

What am I?

Eye.

Posted in Riddles

Sum of 22

Fill in numbers such that the sum of each 3-character row is 22 while the sum of all five numbers is 30.

a
bcd
e

The problem works out to a set of three equations:
b + c + d = 22
a + c + e = 22
a + b + c + d + e = 30

Solving for c = 14, leaving d = 8 – b and e = 8 – a. In other words, c must be 14, but the other two numbers just have to add up to 8. The requirement that they be unique rules out 4 + 4, so you’re left to choose from the following combations for b + d and a + e:
0 + 8
1 + 7
2 + 6
3 + 5

Posted in Brain Teasers

The More You Have, The Less You See

The more you have of it, the less you see. What is it?

Darkness.

Posted in Riddles

Often Talked Of But Never Seen

Often talked of, never seen,
Ever coming, never been,
Daily looked for, never here,
Still approaching, coming near,
Thousands for it’s visit wait,
But alas for their fate,
Tho’ they expect me to appear,
They will never find me here.

Tomorrow.

Posted in Brain Teasers

A Seemingly Simple Math Problem

What is the answer to this problem?

1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1
1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1
1 + 1 × 0 + 1 = ?

30.

There are two tricks to this one. The first is 1 × 0. But it’s mostly there as a distraction. Yes, 1 × 0 is 0, but that doesn’t affect anything else in the equation. The second, far trickier element is that the lines ending with 1 don’t have a + sign next to them. That means they should be combined with the following line.

Let’s put the equation all on one line, shall we?

1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 11 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 11 + 1 × 0 + 1 = ?

And the answer to that equation is 30.

Posted in Brain Teasers

Throw Away Outside, Cook Inside

You throw away the outside and cook the inside. Then you eat the outside and throw away the inside. What did you eat?

An ear of corn.

Posted in Riddles