Can You Take Half an Insect

I am an insect.  Take away half and you'll still have an insect, just not the same one.  

What am I?

Beheadings Are So 1700s

How will you behead sixty eight and leave eighteen?

Image via Wikipedia

Put Down Your Pencils

Image by Horia Varlan via Flickr

Some pencils are erasers. All erasers are papers. Some papers are pens and some pens are erasers. So pencils are obviously pens? True or false?

I Was Late for That First Meeting to Schedule the Meeting About the Conference

Yesterday morning I ended up waiting for 30 minutes for a bus.  According to the schedule, a bus should arrive at my stop every 10 minutes.  That was the start of a particularly bad day for me.

Today, I woke up and felt like today was going to be better.  I expect when I show up at the bus stop, it will be either right there or come within the first minute.

Am I doomed to disappointment?

Randoml Picking Socks May Not Be the Best Spelling

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Yesterday I asked the following question. A drawer contains 4 blue socks, 6 gray socks, and 8 black socks. You randoml choose one sock, then another from the drawer. What is the probability that you choose 2 socks that match?

Since I meant randomly and not randoml, we decided the odds of picking a match on the first try was about 32%. Let's extend the problem a little bit.

If you hadn't picked a match the first time, I'm assuming you would pick again. What are the odds now? What would happen the third time? How long until you do find a match?

Dressing in the Dark Again

Image via Wikipedia

A drawer contains 4 blue socks, 6 gray socks, and 8 black socks. You randoml choose one sock, then another from the drawer. What is the probability that you choose 2 socks that match?

Apple a Day Keeps the Barrels Away

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A barrel contains only apples and oranges. There are twice as many apples as oranges. The apples are either red or yellow and 4 times as many red as are yellow. If one piece of fruit is to be drawn at random from the barrel, what is the probability that the piece drawn will be a yellow apple?

Politics Gets in the Way

A poll is conducted the day before a state election for senator. There are only two candidates and the poll shows that 53% of the oters surveyed favor the Green candidate, with a margin of 2.5 percentage points. Should the Green candidate plan a victory party?

To Each Their Own Place

Image by gtmcknight via Flickr

Susie loved animals and had a large collection of stuffed animals. However, there were several that were her favorites. She decided this morning to rearrange her stuffed animals and give each of her favorites a special place in her room. Along with a name, each of her favorite stuffed animals also had an age and all were younger than her, of course. Determine the names of her favorite stuffed animals, the type of each animal, how old she deemed each of the animals (from one to five years), and where in her room she placed each of her favorites.

1. The skunk was two years old. The tiger was a year younger than the animal placed on the bookshelf, but the tiger was also a year older than Cuddles.

2. The animal placed on the chair was two years older than Willie and a year younger than the whale.

3. Cuddles wasn’t the skunk. Boo wasn’t five years old.

4. The cat was placed on the bed.

5. The bear was two years older than Spot. Amee was the whale but she wasn’t placed on the pillow.

6. Cuddles wasn’t placed on the bench.




To be clear, you need to line up the name, type, age and place for each of the stuffed animals.
Names: Amee, Boo, Cuddles, Spot, Willie
Type: Bear, Cat, Skunk, Whale, Tiger
Age: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5
Place: Bed, Bench, Bookshelf, Chair, Pillow

Day at the Beach

Image by anyjazz65 via Flickr

Yesterday was such a beautiful day, four couples decided to spend the day at the beach. They had a great day of fun in the sun. At one point, each couple went off on their own for a while to enjoy their favorite beach activity. Determine each couple's full names (one man's name is Hank), the color of each woman's bathing suit, and each couple's favorite activity.

1. Mark Collins and his wife were not the couple that liked to swim in the ocean. Rachel wasn't wearing a green bathing suit.

2. Mr. Bailey and his wife collected shells, but they didn't have blue bathing suits. Tabitha's husband wasn't Mark.

3. Peter's last name wasn't Delgado and his wife didn't wear a green bathing suit.

4. Sally and Peter were not the couple that liked to climb on the rocks along the shore's edge.

5. The woman in the red bathing suit loved swimming in the ocean. Louis, whose last name wasn't Colby, enjoyed sunbathing with his wife. Tabitha didn't wear the purple bathing suit.

6. Vanessa, whose last name wasn't Collins, went swimming with her husband.


To be clear, here are the names, activities, and colors.
Rachel, Sally, Tabitha, Vanessa
Hank, Louis, Mark, Peter
Bailey, Colby, Collins, Delgado
Blue, Green, Purple, Red
Climb Rocks, Collect shells, Sunbathe, Swim

Looks Like Boggle

Arrange the alphabet (except the letter Q) in a 5x5 grid. (The first line is ABCDE, the second is FGHIJ, etc.)

A B C D E
F G H I J
K L M N O
P R S T U
V W X Y Z

Begin with any letter. Move one letter at a time horizontally, vertically or diagonally, accumulating letters in order to form a word. For example, GAB would be an acceptable word. What is the longest word you can make without reusing a letter?

Back From the Beach

1. What's the friendliest way to start your day at the beach?
2. What did the baby whale say as he headed south?
3. What's the best place to go shopping on the ocean?

In case you were wondering, I've been on vacation the past week. I meant to keep updating here, but it just didn't happen. Sorry about that.

White as Milk

In marble walls as white as milk,
Lined with skin as soft as silk,
Within a fountain crystal clear,
A golden apple does appear.

Who is Driving the Bus

As I was going to St. Ives,
I met a man with seven wives,
Each wife had seven sacks,
Each sack had seven cats,
Each cat had seven kits,
Kits, cats, sacks, wives,
How many were going to St. Ives?