This Weeks Tweak: 20 Quiz Questions

Mind-benders help exercise your brain by forcing you to think in creative, unexpected ways. These are tried and true examples from around the net, and may not be new to you, but even so, they force you to think just for that extra second.

(To see the answers, select the text inside the brackets with your mouse.)

1. A rancher has a herd of 25 cattle. All but 9 die in a horrible outbreak of mad-cow disease. How many does he have left?
   Answer:< 9 are left. >
2. Is it legal for a man in San Francisco to marry his widow’s sister?
   Answer: <No… If his wife is a widow, the man is dead. >
3. How many animals of each sex did Moses take on the ark?Answer:< Moses didn’t put animals on an ark, Noah did. >
4. After adjusting for inflation, are 1965 pennies or 2007 pennies worth more?
   Answer: <Two thousand and seven pennies are worth exactly 42 cents more than one thousand, nine hundred and sixty five pennies.>
5. If there are 10 apples and you take away 4, how many do you have?
   Answer: <Four. You took four…. remember? >
6. You have two coins in your pocket. They add up to 30 cents. One of the coins is not a nickel. What are the two coins?
   Answer: < A quarter and a nickel… >
   
   
7. Imagine you are the driver of a bus. When you start your route trip, a balding business man, a young mother and her red-headed toddler are already on board. At the first stop, three teenage girls get on the bus. At the second stop (A fast food restaurant) the mother and her toddler get off, and five members of a rock band get on. At the third stop, the business man gets off, and a nun carrying a canary in a cage gets on the bus. The bus ends its route at the mall, and everyone gets off. What is the name of the bus driver?
   Answer: < Weren’t YOU supposed to be the driver?You do remember your own name, don’t you?>
8. Start with three coins: a penny, a nickel and a quarter. Say, “Tommy’s mother has three children. The first child’s name is Penny.” (Hold up the penny while saying this.) “The second child’s name is Nick.” (Hold up the nickel.) What is the third child’s name? (Hold up the quarter.)
   Answer: <Tommy!>
9. What do you call a person who doesn’t have all of their fingers on one hand?
   Answer: < Normal. Half of a persons fingers are on their right hand, half on their left >
10. A red house is made from red bricks, a blue house is made from blue bricks, a pink house is made from pink bricks, and a black house is made from black bricks. What is a greenhouse made from?
    Answer : < Glass.(Or some modern equivalent)>
11. How much dirt is there in a hole that is 4 ft deep, 10 ft long and 3 ft wide?
    Answer:< None. >
12. Mr & Mrs Johnson have 9 children. Half of them are boys. How can that be right?
    Answer: <Because all 9 are boys.>
13. In any standard English (or US English) there is always one word that is spelled incorrectly. What is it?
    Answer: <Incorrectly>
14. Why is it against the law for a man living in North Dakota to be buried in South Dakota?
    Answer: < Because he’s still *living* in North Dakota. >
15. 2008 is a leap year. How many months this year have 28 days?
    Answer: < All of them >
16. Say the word “silk” outloud three times. Now spell silk .. S - I- L- K.
    What do cows drink?
    Answer: < Water >
17. The Spanish Civil War began July 17 of 1936 and ended April 1, 1939. Who was Spain at war with?
    Answer: < Spain >
18. In a large American city, 75% of the phone numbers are listed. 15% of the phone numbers are business numbers, and 10% of the phone numbers begin with a “4″. If you randomly sampled 100 phone numbers from this city’s phone book, how many numbers would you expect to be unlisted, non-business phone numbers that don’t start with “4″?
    Answer: < None. They’re unlisted. >
19. How many two-cent stamps are there in a dozen?
    Answer: < A dozen. >
20. Imagine you are in a lifeboat surrounded by sharks, in the middle of the ocean. The lifeboat springs a leak. How can you survive?
    Answer: < It’s only your imagination… I think you’ll live!
    Unless, of course, you die of embarrassment from having missed such lame trick questions! >
    

So how’d you do? (I admit I missed several. It’s especially awkward since I *know* I’ve seen all of these before.)