Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Puzzle Calendar - 03/09/07

QUESTION: "1) Take a word that means 'to rupture' and change on letter to find a word that means 'austere.'

"2) Take a word that means 'to mount,' and change one letter to find the word for a weather area."




MY ANSWER: "1) Every time I see the word 'austere', all I can think about is Paul Auster and why I haven't read more of his books even though he seems like my kind of author. Pass. 2) Seeing 'mount' and 'weather' together only makes me think 'mountain'...and maybe also of super-fake-named meteorologist Johnny Mountain. Pass."

ACTUAL ANSWER: "1) break, bleak 2) climb, clime"


CONSENSUS: I was going to come back to this one.

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Puzzle Calendar - 03/08/07

QUESTION: "Find the letter that best completes the following sequence.

"A _ B Y C Z D"




MY ANSWER: "X"

ACTUAL ANSWER: "X (There are two sequences: ABCD and XYZ.)"


CONSENSUS: Zzzzz.

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Puzzle Calendar - 03/07/07

QUESTION: "The names of three people are hidden in the sentence below. Can you find them? (The letters are in consecutive order.)

"It was a hard other choice: a car older than you or a new scooter."




MY ANSWER: "???"

ACTUAL ANSWER: "Asa, Dot, Carol"


CONSENSUS: I really hate you sometimes, Mensa calendar. The last time we did this, I got screwed specifically because I tried to find hidden words that existed consecutively within the sentence, one after the other. Thinking my lesson had been learned, that's exactly what I wasn't looking for in this puzzle...only to find out that what I didn't do was exactly what I would have needed to do in order to find the answers. Your inconsistency in format of instruction is exasperating.

Also: "Asa"? Really?

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Puzzle Calendar - 03/06/07

QUESTION: "A simple substitution code has been used to conceal a 'quote.' Work out the code to decipher the original words.

"Little Bo-Peep:
"QMFBTF EPOU CSJOH UIFN IPNF. J'N DPOTJEFSJOH B DBSFFS DIBOHF."




MY ANSWER: "Please don't bring them home. I'm considering a career change."

ACTUAL ANSWER: "Please don't bring them home. I'm considering a career change. (Code: A = B, B = C, C = D, etc.)"


CONSENSUS: I think we can rule out Little Bo-Peep as a suspect in the Zodiac murders. (But why does "I'm" get an apostrophe while "don't" doesn't?)

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Puzzle Calendar - 02/22/07

QUESTION: "In the school lunchroom, one table and half a table ate a pizza and a half in a minute and a half. At the same rate, how many pizzas could two tables of hungry children eat in three minutes?"




MY ANSWER: "Six"

ACTUAL (B.S.) ANSWER: "four pizzas (Each table eats a pizza in a minute and a half, so the cafeteria manager will need four pizzas.)"


CONSENSUS: Hogwash! Each table and a half eats a pizza in a minute and a half, not each table. Each table actually eats a pizza in a minute, which means that in three minutes they would eat three pizzas...and in three minutes two tables would eat six pizzas. The answer is six, and my Mensa calendar contains a typo. Who do I report this to? (Also, why did a character of "cafeteria manager" need to enter into this scenario? Feels extraneous.)

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Puzzle Calendar - 02/20/07

QUESTION: "Stephanie bought some small souvenirs for a Mardi Gras party. At the first store, she spent half of what she had, plus $10 for bead strings. At the second store she bought colorful beads for half of what she had left, plus $10. On the way home, she bought some postcards with half of what she had left. She ended up with $5.

"How much money did Stephanie start out with?"




MY ANSWER: "$100"

ACTUAL ANSWER: "$100 (1/2 of 100 = $50; $50 + $10 = $60, leaving $40; 1/2 of $40 = $20; $20 + $10 = $30, leaving $10; 1/2 of $10 = $5, leaving $5)"


CONSENSUS: Stephanie has a spending problem, and I'm a math genius.

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Calendar - 02/16/07

QUESTION: "Which of the scrambled words below is least like the others? (The difference has nothing to do with vowels, consonants or syllables.)

"NNGPAITI SCLPUTREU SIMUC LLWA"




MY ANSWER: "That'd be 'LLWA', since it forms 'WALL', which, unlike the other three words ('PAINTING', 'SCULPTURE', 'MUSIC'), is not an art."

ACTUAL ANSWER: "WALL (The other three words name art forms: PAINTING, SCULPTURE, MUSIC.)


CONSENSUS: Der.

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Calendar - 02/15/07

QUESTION: "If a bottle with a deposit costs $1.10, and the bottle costs a dollar more than the deposit, how much is the bottle worth?"




MY ANSWER: "$0.10"

ACTUAL ANSWER "$1.05 (no, not $1.10)"


CONSENSUS: While it's good to see that you've significantly raised your game since yesterday, Mensa calendar, I must protest to the vagueness of this question. When you ask "how much is the bottle worth?", one can reasonably assume that you mean to the purchaser, who--after initially paying $1.10 for a bottle then receiving $0.10 on the deposit return (which I think is what you're saying)--would have ultimately paid only a dollar, thus making the bottle worth ten cents to him (perhaps more, depending on the deliciousness of the beverage it had once contained). In short--I'm confused.

Also...what's up with the smugness of your answer? It's only mid-February; I don't think you've yet earned the right to talk me like that.

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Puzzle Calendar - 02/14/07

QUESTION: "The following simple substitution cryptogram, in the form of a rhyme, can be easily solved.

"18-15-19-5-9 1-18-5 18-5-4
22-9-15-12-5-20-19 1-18-5 2-12-21-5.
20-8-9-19 3-18-25-16-20-15-7-18-1-13
23-1-19 4-5-19-9-7-14-5-4 6-15-18 25-15-21."




MY ANSWER: "Roses are red, violets are blue. This cryptogram was designed for you." (1=A, 2=B, 3=C, etc.)

ACTUAL ANSWER: "Roses are red, violets are blue. This cryptogram was designed for you." (A=1, B=2, C=3, etc.)


CONSENSUS: Seriously, Mensa calendar? Again? I'll let this offense slide on the grounds that it's a holiday, but one more occurrence of such patronizing child's play and I might start to lose respect for you.

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Puzzle Calendar - 02/13/07

QUESTION: "What two words, formed from different arrangements of the same seven letters, can be used to complete the sentence below?"

"As sure as there is a _______ every day, a company that _______ you against losses will find some loophole."




MY ANSWER: "sunrise, insures"

ACTUAL ANSWER: "sunrise, insures"


CONSENSUS: This question has a low correct-answer rate in certain areas of Alaska.

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Puzzle Calendar - 02/09/07

QUESTION: "A simple substitution code has been used to conceal a 'quote.' Work out the code to decipher the original words.

"Little Miss Muffet:
9 14-5-22-5-18 12-9-11-5-4 3-21-18-4-19 1-14-4 23-8-5-25 20-15 2-5-7-9-14 23-9-20-8."




MY ANSWER: "I never liked curds and whey to begin with." (A=1, B=2, C=3, etc.)

ACTUAL ANSWER: "I never liked curds and whey to begin with." (1=A, 2=B, 3=C, etc.)


CONSENSUS: Man, when they say "simple", they mean it. I suspect that my Mensa calendar's ATM PIN might be "1-2-3-4-5".

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Puzzle Calendar - 02/08/07

QUESTION: "Place the same three-letter word in each blank below to make five different words.

"___E
___TROT
___WOOD
___MA
___LEG"




MY ANSWER: "DOG"

ACTUAL ANSWER: "DOG"


CONSENSUS: Even if you're only certain of two ("DOGWOOD" and "DOGMA") out of a potential five words, a lazy guess can defeat the Mensa calendar. Hooray for lazy guesses!

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Puzzle Calendar - 02/06/07

QUESTION: "An eight-letter word is spelled out in the box below. Find it by beginning with the correct letter and moving clockwise or counterclockwise around the box, using each letter only once.

"[As the letters appeared clockwise inside the box, beginning in the upper right hand corner:] I N G B O T T L"




MY ANSWER: "BOTTLING"

ACTUAL ANSWER: "BOTTLING"


CONSENSUS: Even a Mensa calendar can't bring its 'A' game 365 days a year.

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Puzzle Calendar - 02/02/07

QUESTION: "The names of three capital cities are interlettered below. Can you find them? (The letters are in consecutive order.)

"L W O O A T N S T D H A O I W N N A P G M O T C I O L T N"




MY ANSWER: "I don't think I understand the question."

ACTUAL ANSWER: "London, Washington, Ottawa"


CONSENSUS: Bullshit. "The letters are in consecutive order"? I spent my time trying to unscramble three consecutive capital city names from that row of letters. The directions were unclear. (Also, it didn't help that I was searching exclusively for American state capitals, because I'm a patriot.) Screw you, Mensa calendar.

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Puzzle Calendar - 02/01/07

QUESTION: "Five words starting with FE or FEB are defined in the list below. Can you fill in all five?

"1) Feverish _______
2) Part of a car ______
3) Catlike ______
4) A particular artery ______
5) Irresponsible ______"




MY ANSWERS:
1) "______"
2) "fender"
3) "feline"
4) "femoral"
5) "______"

ACTUAL ANSWERS:
1) "febrile"
2) "fender"
3) "feline"
4) "femoral"
5) "feckless"


CONSENSUS: I got "femoral" but I couldn't think of "feckless"? This can only mean one thing: my Mensa calendar is making my brain so powerful that it is beginning to reserve itself for the processing of difficult questions while it disregards easy ones. I can live with that. (As for "febrile", nobody knows what the hell that means. "Feverish", apparently.)

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Puzzle Calendar - 01/31/07

QUESTION: "A popular proverb has been put into fancy language below. Can you put it back into its original form?

"The most highly prized objects are often seen upon arrival as being contained in minuscule arrangements."




MY ANSWER: "All that glitters is not gold."

ACTUAL ANSWER: "Good things come in small packages."


CONSENSUS: That "minuscule arrangements" part gave me great doubt about my answer, but my idiot train got so much momentum from "upon arrival" (thinking that it meant the person's arrival to the object, not vice versa) that it just couldn't be stopped. You're lucky I have no control over my brain, calendar.

Me vs. My Page-A-Day Mensa Puzzle Calendar - 01/30/07

QUESTION:

"Joe likes Kate but not Elizabeth. He likes Andy but not David, and he likes Sam but not Roger. Using the same logic, will he like Dick or William?"




MY ANSWER: "Dick (shortened name)"

ACTUAL ANSWER: "Dick (Joe only likes nicknames)"


CONSENSUS: Everybody knows that Joe likes Dick.