inside First Gizmodo Puzzle Monday, I promise you: I swear the puzzles I post here aren’t gimmicks, and what they seem to be asking is exactly what they’re asking. At issue 35, I think I’ve kept my promise, but in honor of April Fools’ Day, it’s time to break one of my rules. Here’s an example of the kind of gimmick I’m talking about:
I have two US coins, which add up to 30 cents. One of them is not a nickel. What are these two coins?
Answer: A quarter and a nickel. One of them wasn’t a nickel, but the other one was.
It’s the brainteaser equivalent of a dad joke. They are full of confusion. I avoid complainers because I believe in the importance of trusting the source of one’s confusion. If I mixed real puzzles with trick questions, you’d always be tiptoeing for deception and missing out on real insight.
Don’t get me wrong, there’s a special kind of satisfaction that comes from outsmarting a tough problem. For the first time ever, we’re offering a $750,000 cash prize to whoever solves all of this week’s puzzles. do not trust me? There’s only one way to find out.
Did you miss last week’s puzzle?check it out here, and find its solution at the bottom of today’s article. If you haven’t solved last week’s question yet, be careful not to read too far into it!
Puzzle #36: April Fools’ Day
- Rope ladders hang from the edge of the boat. The ladder is 20 feet long with rungs 1 foot apart. The bottom steps were barely grazed by water. The tide is rising 3 inches per hour. How long will it take for the bottom nine steps of the ladder to be flooded?
- Which is more valuable, a nickel for a gallon or a dime for a half-gallon?
- A man leaves his home and makes three left turns. When he returned home, he saw two men wearing masks. Who are these people?
- You meet two girls named Chloe Smith and Zoe Smith. They look alike and you ask them if they are twins. They said, “No, but we have the same parents and we were born on the same day, the same year, the same month.” How is that possible?
- I felt bad leaving you with just some fancy puzzles, so I added a real puzzle. I come to you with curious observations. I pick a number and if it’s even, I divide it by 2, but if it’s odd, I multiply it by 3 and then add 1. I then repeat this process no matter what the resulting number is. For example, if I start with 5, the sequence is: 5, 16, 8, 4, 2, 1. This is because 5 is an odd number, so I first multiply by 3 and add 1 to get 16, which is an even number, so I divide by 2 to get 8, which is also an even number, and so on. I noticed that no matter what number I started with, I would eventually reach 1. Can you explain why? This shouldn’t be too difficult, but if you need a hint, I’ve provided one here.
I’ll be back next Monday with answers and new puzzles. Do you know a cool puzzle that you think should be featured here?Leave me a message on X @JackPMurtagh or email me gizmodopuzzle@gmail.com
Solution to Puzzle #35: Detective Fiction
have you found Last week’s detective story primary? I was delighted to see several new commenters last week. I may cover more detective stories in future articles.
1. In the first story, the police chief said that Didi’s apartment was dark and he only saw the suicide note on the bed when he turned on the light. We’re told it’s a nice day and Didi lives in a studio apartment. Sherlock reasoned that if Diddy jumped out of his window, then the windows in his apartment should still be open and light should be streaming in. Someone must have closed the windows or blinds there.
2. In the second story, the chief believed Mrs. Howe died at home. All we know is that she died of suffocation at 6:00 p.m. Sherlock speculates that Mrs. Howe may have left home to meet her husband somewhere near his workplace. He could have killed her elsewhere and placed the body in his home.
speak out frslou89 In order to solve these two cases. Some of you have come up with an alternative solution for the second detective novel: Mr. Howe’s office is in a different time zone than his home. This would give him an extra hour to drive home and arrive in time to kill Mrs. Howe by 6:00 PM. It’s a smart idea, but I completely ignored the possibility. Thrilling 000 Point out that Sherlock solves crimes in England, which only has one time zone.