REMINDERS: Answers in red. Solvers (submitted/correct) in blue. (Forgive any omissions, but feel free to inform.) Comments in green. For further elaboration on solutions, please feel free to ask!
- Always, sometimes, or never? A given rectangle is also a square. Sometimes. Some rectangles are squares, some are not. Anita Dixon, Rita Barger, Amy Ragsdale.
- What’s the second smallest 3-digit palindromic prime? A) 111 B) 131 C) 313 D) None of the above E) No answer possible. B) 131 (The smallest is 101.) Anita Dixon, Amy Ragsdale.
- What’s the perimeter of a semicircle of radius pi? (pi)^2 – 2*pi Anita Dixon, Rita Barger
- A card is drawn from a ‘normal’ deck of playing cards (no jokers). What’s the probability that the card is either a spade or a face card (J,Q, or K) or both? 22/52 = 11/26. (There are 22 cards in the deck that are either a spade or a face card [or both].) Anita Dixon, Rita Barger
Due to wording and meaning interpretations, several answers were accepted. Commonly the ‘answer’ here is 3, but the word ‘least’ was not used, so others apply. And, a very strong argument was made for 2 as well. Anita Dixon, Rita Barger, Amy Ragsdale.- The integers 2 and 3 are both primes. Why are they the only two consecutive integers that are both prime? Every consecutive pair of integers contains an even number. Since 2 is the only even prime, this is the only place this can happen. Anita Dixon, Rita Barger, Amy Ragsdale.
- What are the last two letters in this sequence: T, N, E, S, S, F, F, T, __, __. T, O. (Ten, Nine, Eight, . . . Two, One.)(I took one other creative and almost-matching solution.) Anita Dixon, Rita Barger, Amy Ragsdale.
- What 5-letter English (and British) word has the unique quality that its last four letters are silent? Queue. Anita Dixon, Rita Barger, Amy Ragsdale.
- Bonus Trivia: A) What was the name of the first artificial satellite launched? Sputnik. B) What year was it launched? 1957. (Oct 4). Anita Dixon, Amy Ragsdale.
D. 10 Anita Dixon, Amy Ragsdale. (Easy to make order-of-operation careless mistakes here. I did it myself at first !)- Add one mathematical symbol to 55555 to make a statement that equals 500. 555-55. Anita Dixon, Rita Barger, Amy Ragsdale.
- Which year in the last century read the same upside down and backwards? 1961. Anita Dixon, Rita Barger, Amy Ragsdale.
- The Smiths have four daughters. Each of their daughters has a brother. What’s the least amount of children the Smiths could have? 5. Anita Dixon, Rita Barger, Amy Ragsdale.
- What occurs twice in a week, once in a year, but never in a day? The letter e. Anita Dixon, Rita Barger, Amy Ragsdale.
- TRIVIA: You might know this if you’re a Smothers Brothers fan (or you could google it and who’d know?). How did the name Fred Hurley and the date 1946 play into a Smothers Brothers routine on their (very old) show? Tom claimed that Fred Hurley (from Kansas City) invented Rock ‘n’ Roll in 1946. See the clip (start about 1:30) *
- Five couples (10 people) are going on a camping trip for 3 days. They need to carry their own wather and they read in a guide book that 12.5 liters per day are needed for a party of 5 persons. How much water should they carry? 75 liters. Anita Dixon, Rita Barger, Amy Ragsdale.
* I’ve had problems getting this to display consistently. If needed, see the link(s) back in the main Mailing.
Bonus 1: A circle of radius 1 is inscribed inside the only square that fits. What’s the area of the part of the square which is NOT in/on the circle? 4 – pi sq. units. Anita Dixon, Rita Barger, Amy Ragsdale.
Bonus 2: See #6 above. Two primes that are only two apart (like 5 & 7. 11 & 13, 107 & 109, etc) are called twin primes. Consider the statement “except for 3 & 5, the number between two twin primes is divisible by 6.” Is that statement A) always true, B) sometimes true, C) never true, or D) impossible to determine? A) always true. Since the # between two primes must be both even and a multiple of 3 [why?], it must be a multiple of 6. Anita Dixon, Rita Barger, Amy Ragsdale.
Bonus 3: (See Bonus 2 above, as needed). One of these statements below is true, one is false, and one is unknown. Which is which?
A) The set of primes is infinite. True.
B) The set of twin primes is infinite. Unknown.
C) The set of ‘trip primes’ (like 3,5,7) is infinite. False. (Indeed, that’s the only such set!).
Anita Dixon, Rita Barger, Don Hayes.
Bonus 4: See #12 above. When will that phenomenon happen again? 6009 (though I also took 6119). Anita Dixon, Amy Ragsdale.
Bonus 5: See #16 above. If one couple backs out, how much water will they need? 60 liters.
