You are on your way to visit your Grandma, who lives at the end of the valley. It's her anniversary, and you want to give her the cakes you've made. Between your house and her house, you have to cross 5 bridges, and as it goes in the land of make believe, there is a troll under every bridge! Each troll, quite rightly, insists that you pay a troll toll. Before you can cross their bridge, you have to give them half of the cakes you are carrying, but as they are kind trolls, they each give you back a single cake.
How many cakes do you have to leave home with to make sure that you arrive at Grandma's with exactly 2 cakes?
2 Cakes
How?
At each bridge you are required to give half of your cakes, and you receive one back. Which leaves you with 2 cakes after every bridge.
A wealthy man lives alone in a small cottage. Being partially handicapped, he had everything delivered to his cottage. The mailman was delivering a letter one Thursday when he noticed that the front door was ajar. Through the opening he could see the man's body lying in a pool of dried blood. When a police officer arrived he surveyed the scene. On the porch were two bottles of warm milk, Monday's newspaper, a catalog, flyers, and unopened mail. The police officer suspects it was foul play. Who does he suspect and why?
The police officer suspects the newspaper delivery person. The absence of Tuesday's and Wednesday's newspaper indicates that the delivery person knew there was no one there to read it.
A deliveryman comes to a house to drop off a package. He asks the woman who lives there how many children she has.
"Three," she says. "And I bet you can't guess their ages."
"Ok, give me a hint," the deliveryman says.
"Well, if you multiply their ages together, you get 36," she says. "And if you add their ages together, the sum is equal to our house number."
The deliveryman looks at the house number nailed to the front of her house. "I need another hint," he says.
The woman thinks for a moment. "My youngest son will have a lot to learn from his older brothers," she says.
The deliveryman's eyes light up and he tells her the ages of her three children. What are their ages?
Their ages are 1, 6, and 6. We can figure this out as follows:
Given that their ages multiply out to 36, the possible ages for the children are:
1, 1, 36 (sum = 38)
1, 2, 18 (sum = 21)
1, 3, 12 (sum = 16)
1, 4, 9 (sum = 14)
1, 6, 6 (sum = 13)
2, 2, 9 (sum = 13)
2, 3, 6 (sum = 11)
3, 3, 4 (sum = 10)
When the woman tells the deliveryman that the children's ages add up to her street number, he still doesn't know their ages. The only way this could happen is that there is more than one possible way for the children's ages to add up to the number on the house (or else he would have known their ages when he looked at the house number). Looking back at the possible values for the children's ages, you can see that there is only one situation in which there are multiple possible values for the children's ages that add up to the same sum, and that is if their ages are either 1, 6, and 6 (sums up to 13), or 2, 2, and 9 (also sums up to 13). So these are now the only possible values for their ages.
When the woman then tells him that her youngest son has two older brothers (who we can tell are clearly a number of years older), the only possible situation is that their ages are 1, 6, and 6.
Romeo and Juliet are found dead in a small puddle of water, surrounded by broken glass. The apartment building they are found in is located next to the city's main train station. How did they die?
Romeo and Juliet are fish. A passing train rattled the shelf their tank was sitting on and knocked it off of the shelf. The tank broke and the fish died from being out of the water.
Sally and her younger brother were fighting. Their mother was tired of the fighting, and decided to punish them by making them stand on the same piece of newspaper in such a way that they couldn't touch each other. How did she accomplish this?
Sally's mother slid a newspaper under a door and made Sally stand on one side of the door and her brother on the other.
There are 5 ships in a port.
The Greek ship leaves at six and carries coffee.
The ship in the middle has a black chimney.
The English ship leaves at nine.
The French ship with a blue chimney is to the left of a ship that carries coffee.
To the right of the ship carrying cocoa is a ship going to Marseille.
The Brazilian ship is heading for Manila.
Next to the ship carrying rice is a ship with a green chimney.
A ship going to Genoa leaves at five.
The Spanish ship leaves at seven and is to the right of the ship going to Marseille.
The ship with a red chimney goes to Hamburg.
Next to the ship leaving at seven is a ship with a white chimney.
The ship on the border carries corn.
The ship with a black chimney leaves at eight.
The ship carrying corn is anchored next to the ship carrying rice.
The ship to Hamburg leaves at six.
Which ship goes to Port Said? Which ship carries tea?
A bus driver was heading down a street in Colorado. He went right past a stop sign without stopping, he turned left where there was a "no left turn" sign, and he went the wrong way on a one-way street. Then he went on the left side of the road past a cop car. Still - he didn't break any traffic laws.
Why not?
You have two sand hourglasses, one that measures exactly 4 minutes and one that measures exactly 7 minutes. You need to measure out exactly 2 minutes to boil an egg. Using only these two hourglasses, how can you measure out exactly 2 minutes to boil your egg?
Flip over both hourglasses at the same time.
1. After 4 minutes, the 4-minute hourglass will be done, and there will be 3 minutes left in the 7-minute hourglass. Immediately flip the 4-minute hourglass over again.
2. After 3 more minutes, the 7-minute hourglass will be done, and there will be exactly 1 minute left in the 4-minute hourglass. Immediately flip the 7-minute hourglass over again.
3. After 1 more minute, the 4-minute hourglass will be done again, and there will be exactly 6 minutes left in the 7-minute hourglass. Immediately flip over the 4-minute hourglass.
4. After 4 more minutes, the 4-minute hourglass will be done again, and there will be exactly 2 minutes left in the 7-minute hourglass. At this point, put your egg in the boiling water. When the 7-minute hourglass is done, it will have been exactly 2 more minutes, and your egg will have boiled just right.
Or after step 2 just flip 7-minute hourglass for second minute.
A man was shot to death while in his car. There were no powder marks on his clothing which indicated that the gunman was outside the car. However, all the windows were up and the doors locked. After a close inspection was made, the only bullet holes discovered were on the man's body. How was he murdered?
A crime has been committed at Freemont Street. The main suspect is a man named Sean Baker. It was said that a man had been walking along the pathway when he was suddenly shot in the stomach. The suspect had brown hair, blue eyes and wore a baggy Armani suit just like Sean Baker's. Sean was asked to tell the story right from the beginning. "Well," said Sean, "I was just hanging around the park when I saw this man walking along the pathway. Suddenly, a guy came up from behind him and shot him! I ran home as fast as I could. The policemen asked him to give a description of the murderer. "He had a red mustache, red hair and a baggy Armani suit on."
"I think this man is telling a lie," said one of the policemen. How did he know?
How can the murderer shoot him in the stomach if he came up behind the man?
