I Don’t C You

Imagine that, in an ordinary square-shaped room, we hammer a nail into each of the four walls and then one nail into the ceiling and one into the floor.

E4

Some years back, I was in an ICU for a day (though heck only knows why they call it that considering you can’t see anyone… Wait, maybe it’s because the guy in the white coat who invariably appears in toothpaste commercials later can see you). So I asked my ambulatory other to get me a few books from home — specifying in detail their names, authors and, in one case, even its Library of Congress Catalogue number. But she who thinks I’m some kind of horribly twisted ogre, who eats riddles instead of children for breakfast, brought me back something from 40 years ago. So bless her heart as you solve this gently lifted puzzle from that time.

Imagine that, in an ordinary square-shaped room, we hammer a nail into each of the four walls and then one nail into the ceiling and one into the floor. We have with us pieces of strings in two colours — say, blue and red. Now connect every nail with every other nail using a new piece of string each time. The pieces of string will form triangles, one angle of which will be at the nails. The problem is: can we do this without making one triangle in which all the pieces of string forming the three sides are the same colour?

Either way, yes or no, can you give the answer without dipping into Mersenne primes, repunit palindromes and stuff used for making mystic pentagrams of yore, but using only methods beginning without math?

DEAR MS

Words-Worth-Dept:

TWENTYNINE has 29 lines being used to write it in capital letters. NOWHERE can be broken into NOW HERE, which is exactly the opposite. RUPTUREWORT is the 11-letter word we are looking for. SAVVY and GLOWWORM are the words having VV and WW. The 26 words provided by you have alphabets A-Z in them in order; but they are silent when the words are pronounced. The letter A first crops up in THOUSAND.

•Saifuddin SF Khomosi, saif_sfk@hotmail.com

The longest word using the letters QWERTYUIOP on the top line of the typewriter is an eleven letter word PROPRIETORY.

•Dr K Narayana Murty, k_n_murty@yahoo.com

My son Srinath, aged 10, got the word MANUFACTURE as the common word in English with UFA in it in the same order.

•Jayaraman, tvjraman@gmail.com

(The problem was: “Would a lawn sprinkler work underwater if we sucked on the pipe at the other end? And if so, in which direction would it turn?” — MS)

Sprinkling-Of-Physics-Dept:

There are two possibilities to be considered with the act of suction at the tap end. One: the pipe contains no water at the time of suction, in which case you are essentially creating a partial vacuum within the pipe to the extent of air being sucked out in one breath (which in itself can only be achieved by pinching one’s nose). The vacuum so created is unlikely to be effective enough to cause the sprinkler to rotate. If at all it did, it’s likely in the opposite direction (which I’m not entirely sure about). Also, the sprinkler systems are so designed that water cannot be drawn in from the sprinkler end. Two: The pipe is already filled with water, in which case it is humanly impossible to do the act of suction (even if the nostrils receive air supply from an attached tubing) unless we evolve external gills.

•Subin, sbn_vtl@yahoo.co.in

(The other problem was: “Why is lying down on your back in quicksand the best thing to do?” — MS)

The-Quick-Solution-Dept:

If we lie down on our backs in quicksand, we float around better on its surface and it makes it easier to get out of it.

•Amatul Nadia, amatul.nadia@gmail.com

ENDGAME

Okay, here’s an easy one (or so you think!). Although all solid stuff feels solid, they’re not, and matter is comprised chiefly of nothing. So why don’t we fall through the floor?

(To get in touch with Mukul, mail him at mukul.mindsport@gmail.com)

• Mindsport