Saturday, November 19, 2005

visitors

Some friends from another state are visiting this weekend. The husband is more my husband's friend ... well I guess originally, and we only know his wife through him. We've seen them maybe once or twice in the last 3 years. Well, what a treat, here I was all thinking, oh, visitors, we have to clean the house and be "on" and such. But. We are having the best time just talking and laughing. You know how it is when you're with people that you just click with ... you like the same things and have had some of the same experiences and find the same things funny. What a great way to spend 2 days off.

And as an extra bonus, I heard the coolest puzzle on NPR's "Click & Clack". Oooooh, all mathie and such. The essence of it is: You are in a corridor with 20,000 hanging lights all with pull cords and all "pulled" off. Someone walks down the hall and pulls every other cord. Then someone walks down the hall and pulls every 3rd cord. Then someone walks down the hall and pulls every 4th cord. ... all the way to .... someone ... bla bla bla ... every 20,000th cord. Is there a way to predict after all this which lights are turned on and which are turned off?

2 comments:

  1. Ooh, ooh! I know this one. It's in the MathCounts stuff, except they use numbered locker doors.

    I tried the simplification, but it went awry. Thanks for posting the answer. I'll try again.

    -- One who does math problems for fun...

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  2. Anonymous9:52 AM

    Just let me know when you want the answer ..... :)

    Ms. Cookie

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