Feb
07

Word Hunt

By admin Posted in Word Puzzle | No Comments »

Here’s Word Hunt by the inimitable Will Shortz.


 

Imagine that the lettered balls in the three-dimensional grid at the right are arranged in two vertical layers: M, S, P / B, S, U / L, A, N in front, and I, T, O / L, E, R / O, C, K in back.

Find as many words of exactly five letters as you can spell by following the rods connecting the balls. You may return to a letter and use it twice in one word (as the I in LIMIT), but you may not “stand” on a letter and use it twice before proceeding (as the T in MITTS).

Be sure not to jump between balls that aren’t connected directly by a rod. For example, BLISS is not an acceptable answer, because no rod connects the I with an S. Plurals are fine. Proper names, prefixes and suffixes, capitalized acronyms and initialisms, hyphenated words and words appearing only as parts of phrases are prohibited.

Finding 30 words is good; 40 is expert; 50 is genius-level.

Your answers?

 


Solution to the Bagel Puzzle of January 3, 2012

(with apologizes for the irregular alignment)

NAME                     BAGEL                             TOPPING                COFFEE                    SIZE

Brad                     cheddar                               plain                       Amaretto                   small

Gerry                    onion                             cream cheese           French  vanilla       large

Rhonda                 sesame                                butter                   hazelnut                 medium

Rick                          wheat                           p. butter                 Columbian                medium

Gloria                  blueberry                      egg&bacon                 regular                         small




Jan
03

Bagels, anyone?

By admin Posted in Logic Puzzles | No Comments »

A logic puzzle to start the new year:

Rhonda and four coworkers stopped by a bagel shop for bagels and coffee. Using the following information, determine what kind of bagel with its topping, and what flavor and size of coffee (small, medium, or large) each ordered.

1. Brad got his bagel, which wasn’t wheat, with nothing on it. Gloria ordered a small coffee.

2. The two coworkers who got medium sized coffees were the one who got the hazelnut flavor and the one who got a bagel with peanut butter.

3. The one who got the onion bagel, but not with butter, also got a French vanilla coffee, but not the small size.

4. The five coworkers were Rhonda, the one who got a large coffee, the one who got Amaretto flavored coffee, the one who got a wheat bagel, and the one who got egg & bacon on his bagel.

5. Rick didn’t order the blueberry bagel but he did get Columbian coffee. The Amaretto coffee was ordered with the cheddar bagel but not by Gloria.

6. The cream cheese did not come with the blueberry bagel but it did come with a large coffee. The sesame bagel came with butter but Gerry didn’t order it.

 

SOLUTION TO DECEMBER’S CRYPTOQUOTE, A CHRISTMAS MESS:

One of the most glorious messes in the world is the mess created in the living room on Christmas day.  Don’t clean it up too quickly.  ~Andy Rooney

 

 

Dec
20

A Christmas mess

By admin Posted in Cryptoquote | No Comments »

A holiday cryptoquote:

MYU MA CVU ZMFC TJMXBMRF ZUFFUF BY CVU EMXJH BF CVU ZUFF PXUSCUH BY CVU JBOBYT XMMZ MY PVXBFCZSF HSL.  HMY’C PJUSY BC RQ CMM GRBPWJL.  ~SYHL XMMYUL

Nov
01

A Mighty Long Rope

By admin Posted in Math Puzzle | 3 Comments »

Here’s another classic, often called the Rope Around the Earth puzzle, but it’s really a simple geometric calculation, not a puzzle.


Suppose you tie a rope around the earth, stretching to just fit snugly around the circumference (supposing also the earth is a sphere!). Then take that same rope, splice it, and added 3 feet to its length. If you stretch it around the Earth again, there will be some slack. If you space that slack evenly, how far off the surface of the planet would the rope be?

What if you did the same exercise with a beach ball? A ping pong ball?

 

 

 

PS — the SOLUTION to the Bridge puzzle of last week is in the comments that follow the puzzle.

Oct
25

Over troubled waters

By admin Posted in Logic Puzzles | 4 Comments »

 

SOLUTION TO THE LOGIC PUZZLE OF OCTOBER 18

Mike did it!

I solved it by using a grid. Take each guy in turn, assume he did it, and see how the statements stack up. The only time you get a T, F or F, T for each guy, is if Mike did it.

Hey, how come there are no female suspects?

Today’s puzzle features a smart girl:

Four boys and a girl are stuck on an island. There’s a bridge to connect the island to the mainland. Halfway across the bridge there’s a guard. The guard won’t let anyone from the mainland to the island, or anyone from the island to the mainland. If the guard catches someone, he sends him or her back. All day and night the guard sleeps for 30 seconds and then is awake for 5 minutes. (The island is surrounded by man-eating sharks; the bridge is the only option.)

The girl thinks of a way to get across. It takes her 1 minute to cross the bridge. How does she cross the bridge without getting caught?

 

SOLUTION TO THE CRYPTOLISTS PUZZLES OF OCTOBER 11:


 

Oct
18

Hands up!

By admin Posted in Logic Puzzles | No Comments »

 

For today, a fun, easy logic puzzle:

After a local bank robbery, five suspects were interviewed by the police. Below is a summary of their statements. Police know that each of them told the truth in one of the statements and lied in the other. Who committed the crime?

• Richard said:
 It wasn’t Chuck.
 It was Pete.

• Mike said:
 It was Chuck.
It wasn’t Pete.

• Chuck said:
 It was Richard.
 It wasn’t Anthony.

• Pete said:
 It was Anthony.
 It wasn’t Richard.

• Anthony said:
 It was Mike.
 It was Pete.

BACK TO WORK ON LAST WEEK’S PUZZLE

No one submitted a solution for last week’s CRYPTOLISTS. Too easy? Too hard? In case it was too hard, I’m including hints, one for each list:

For list 1 MATHEMATICIANS, the third name is AGNESI. (Maria Agnesi, 1718-1799, best known for the equations of the curve called The Witch of Agnesi)

For list 2 SCIENTISTS/INVENTORS, the fourth name is BABBAGE. (Charles Babbage, 1791-1871, considered the father of the computer)

For list 3 PHYSICS TERMS, the first item is NEUTRINO, much in the news lately.

 

 

Oct
11

Cryptolists

By admin Posted in Cryptolist | No Comments »

Here are  three lists of related words in code. Each list has its own code. When you’ve cracked the code for one word, use the known letters to help decode the others on its list. The examples are not included in the lists.

Click on the image below to get a pdf that you can print and work on.

 

 

 

 

SOLUTION TO  ”HOW OLD ARE THE KIDS” PUZZLE (October 4, 2011)

Answer: the children are 2, 2, and 9.

The product of the ages is 36. Using only this information, the following answers are possible

1, 1, 36

1, 2, 18

1, 3, 12

1, 4, 9

1, 6, 6

2, 2, 9

2, 3, 6

3, 3, 4

Mark says that’s not enough information, so Mary gives a known total, the number of sodas consumed. The totals of our possibles are as follows:

1, 1, 36  (total 38)

1, 2, 18  (total 21)

1, 3, 12 (total 16)

1, 4, 9 (total 14)

1, 6, 6 (total 13)

2, 2, 9 (total 13)

2, 3, 6 (total 11)

3, 3, 4 (total 10)

Mark says he still doesn’t have enough information, which means that two of the totals are identical, matching the number of sodas, and therefore we learn that the sum is 13, since all the other totals are unique.

When Mary then refers to her oldest child, we know there must be one child older than either of the other two, leaving 2, 2, 9.



Oct
04

How old are the kids?

By admin Posted in Riddles | 3 Comments »

After last week’s challenge, here’s an easy one. (There is no hint in the image!)

Two friends, Mary and Mark, are chatting:

“How old are your children?” Mark asks.

“There are three of them and the product of their ages is 36,” Mary answers.

“That’s not enough information,” Mark says.

“The sum of their ages is exactly the number of sodas we’ve drunk today,” Mary adds.

“That’s still not enough.”

“Okay, the last thing I’ll tell you is that my oldest child has a red backpack.”

“Now I know,” Mark says.

How old are each of Mary’s children?

 

 

 

SOLUTION TO LAST WEEK’S “UNIVERSE” PUZZLE

1) the basic objects from which all can be made: triangle and square

2) the basic rules: triangles must be attached on one and only one side; squares must be attached on two and only two sides.

 

Sep
27

The Universe

By admin Posted in Science Puzzle | 1 Comment »

Here’s a puzzle I’ve been using in physics classes for a few decades. It’s designed to have you think like a physicist, trying to figure out how the universe works by observing what EXISTS and what DOES NOT EXIST. Physicists learn as much from the latter as from the former. If something DOES NOT EXIST, there’s a reason for it; i.e., there’s a “rule” against it. By comparing what does and does not exist, physicists hope to figure out the rules.

A good real-life example is from spectroscopy (ok, some chemists do this, too). Each element emits a spectrum that’s unique to the element. If a wavelength/frequency is MISSING (does not exist) in the spectrum, that tells us something about the element’s energy levels. BUT you don’t have to know or care about all this to enjoy the puzzle!

HOW DOES THE UNIVERSE WORK?

In the “universe” of the drawings below, the BLACK FIGURES, on the left, are observed; the WHITE FIGURES, on the right, are not observed. (Ignore the background in both cases, and also the slightly larger size of the white figures.)

Determine 1) what are the basic objects (shapes) in this universe, the shapes out of which all of the figures can be made; and 2) what are the rules connecting the shapes, such that some figures are observed (EXIST) and others are not observed (DO NOT EXIST).

 

EXIST                      DO NOT EXIST

 

 

Sep
20

ARE YOU SMARTER THAN A FIFTH GRADER…when it comes to cracking codes?

By admin Posted in Code puzzle | 4 Comments »

What a treat today to welcome PENNY WARNER!

Not even secret operatives know more about codes than Penny.  She’s also written more than 50 books, fiction and nonfiction, and is everywhere you look in the writing and education community.

She can be tough, though. I took a class from her once and she beat my first book out of me. I’m smarting from the wounds, but so glad I met her!

Here’s Penny:

I’ve been a fan of puzzles and codes since I was a kid. I used to talk to my friends in Pig Latin, write the secret notes in Alpha-Numeric Code (each alphabet letter matches a number), and learned the American Sign Language Manual Alphabet so I could communicate with my friends in class without the teacher knowing.

After writing several mystery series for adults, I wanted to write a mystery for middle-grade kids, and thought it might be fun to include a code for the readers to solve in every chapter. THE CODE BUSTERS CLUB: SECRET OF THE SKELETON KEY was just published last week and it’s full codes for fourth-, fifth-, and sixth-graders to solve, such as Morse Code, Braille, Fingerspelling, Alpha-Numeric, Caesar’s Cipher, and even Semaphore. Each reader I meet gets a code-busting kit to go with the book.

While most codes have been around for centuries, one of my favorite codes is called the LEET Code, also known as 1337 Code. It’s a recent high-tech creation based on computer keyboard symbols—and it’s just as challenging for adults as it is for kids!

Try to decode the following message in LEET Code. If you can’t, read hints below. If you can solve it, then you’re welcome to join the Code Busters Club, where you’ll find more codes to solve (www.codebustersclub.com).

Here goes:

 

( 4 /\/   \|/ () (_)   ( |2 4 ( I<   + # 3   ( () I) 3   ?

 

For some people, this is as easy as ABC to decipher the code, but for others, it looks like nonsense. If you’re having trouble reading the sentence above, here’s a hint: Each letter of the alphabet has been replaced by a keyboard symbol that resembles the letter. For example, the parenthesis  ( becomes the letter C. Now can you see what’s right before your eyes?

 

Still stuck? All right, here’s the key:

A = 4     B = 8      C = (     D = |)     E = 3      F = |=   G = 6     H = #      I =  !       J = _|

K = |<     L= |_    M= /\/\   N = /\/    O= ()    P = |*      Q = (,)    R= |2     S = $      T = +

U=(_)     V = \/     W= \/\/    X = *     Y = \|/     Z = 2

 

I hope that was fun. Now you can communicate with your friends via email, using the LEET Code—and all you need is a computer keyboard!

 

Penny Warner is the author of the new middle-grade series, THE CODE BUSTERS CLUB: SECRET OF THE SKELETON KEY, and the adult mystery series, HOW TO HOST A KILLER PARTY. Her new book due out October 2, HOW TO PARTY WITH A KILLER VAMPIRE, is set in Colma, features a Vampire-themed party. She can be reached at www.pennywarner.com.

 

 

 

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