Open Us, Close Us
Open us, and you can’t see us without a mirror.
Close us, and you can’t see us at all. What are we?
SOLUTION
The answer is YOUR EYES.
Category: Puzzles
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A Bunch of Words
Examine the 12 words below and determine what popular proverb is represented by them.
| mimic | iris | picnic |
| pilgrim | love | giving |
| love | rigid | icing |
| spirit | vigil | crisis |
SOLUTION
The answer is LOVE IS BLIND.
All the words in the table have 2 “eyes” (i’s), except for the word “love”.
6 Missing Letters
Fill the blanks with 6 different letters to read a meaningful sentence.
A _losopher of _sic in _na _ght about the _ances of _tch.
SOLUTION
You should add the 6 Greek letters φ (phi), μ (mu), χ (chi), τ (tau), ν (nu), π (pi), and get the sentence:
A philosopher of music in China taught about the nuances of pitch.
Clean Death
A man was going to bleach his socks because they had gotten muddy the day before. As he was pouring the bleach into the washing machine, he spilled some on the floor. He got some cleaning fluid and mopped it up with a rag. Minutes later he was dead. What killed him?
SOLUTION
When the ammonia (NH3), found in cleaning fluids, is mixed with bleach (a dilute solution of sodium hypochlorite, NaOCl), a deadly gas (monochloramine, NH2Cl) is produced that can kill a person instantly. The resulting chemical reactions are the following:
- Bleach decomposes, forming hydrochloric acid and subsequently chlorine gas:
NaOCl → NaOH + HOCl
HOCl → HCl + O
NaOCl + 2HCl → Cl2 + NaCl + H2O - The chlorine gas reacts with the sodium hypochlorite in the bleach, releasing chloramine as a vapor:
2NH3 + Cl2 → 2NH2Cl
In This Shoe…
Fill the three missing numbers (using words) in the shoe below.
Remark: The missing words can be of any length.
SOLUTION
You should fill the words FIVE, THREE, FOUR to get:
“In this shoe, there are five H’s, three O’s, and four T’s.”
Bicycle Tracks
You are chasing a criminal riding a bicycle, and you find his tracks left in the dirt. By investigating the tracks, can you determine which direction the criminal has fled to: left or right?
SOLUTION
The front wheels of the bicycle are traveling more distance and making sharper turns. Thus, the red tracks (as shown on the image below) correspond to the front wheel, and the green tracks correspond to the back wheel.
Then, since the back wheel is always pointing towards the front wheel, we conclude that the bicycle is moving towards the right.
Terrible Rebuses 1
Recognize the phrases depicted by the “terrible rebuses” below.
SOLUTION
- No use over spilled milk.
- Two wrongs don’t make a right.
- The squeaky wheel gets the grease.
- When there is a will, there’s a way.
STANDARD Word
Given the word STANDARD, take away two letters and then add three digits to make a logical sequence.
SOLUTION
Remove the two letters A to get ST-ND-RD and then add the digits 1, 2, 3 to get 1ST-2ND-3RD.
Toasting Bread
Your toaster is broken, so you decide to toast your bread in a pan. The pan can hold three slices of bread at a time and takes 1 minute to toast one of their sides. How much time would it take you to toast four slices of bread on both sides using the pan?
SOLUTION
It would take you 2 minutes and 40 seconds. Label the slices with A, B, C, D, their top sides A1, B1, C1, D1, and their bottom sides A2, B2, C2, D2.
- Toast A1, B1, C1 for 40 seconds.
- Toast A2, B2, D1 for 40 seconds.
- Toast A1, C2, D2 for 20 seconds.
- Toast A2, C2, D2 for 20 seconds.
- Toast B1, C1, D1 for 20 seconds.
- Toast B2, C2, D2 for 20 seconds.