OK, its not quite Midsummer, which (for obscure reasons) is the name given to the start of summer, i.e. the Summer Solstice, this year Friday, June 20, 7:42 p.m. PDT. So it’s time for our annual puzzle edition. (You can find the answers on page 37.)
1. What’s a six-letter word containing three Y’s?
2. You drill a 7,900-mile hole straight down from the Eureka Gazebo and jump in. You come out under the ocean but you manage to swim 500 miles to the closest land. What language do they speak there?
3. A capital letter of the alphabet has been cut out of a piece of paper and folded once. The letter is not L. What is it? (Thanks to Scott Kim.)
4. You’re in the middle of a desert with only a quarter to your name. Suddenly you’re abducted by aliens and lose consciousness. When you wake up, you’re in a small room with no windows or doors. There’s a note: “You are either in a room on the surface of Earth, or you are moving through space with an acceleration of 32 feet per second per second. Which is it? Answer correctly and you will be returned to the desert.” What do you do?
5. A 6-inch-long hole is drilled through the center of a wooden sphere. What’s the volume of the remaining wood? (Volume of sphere = 4/3 . π . r^3)
6. What’s the only letter not found in the names of the 50 U.S. States?
7. A recent New York Times crossword clue was: Race car, e.g. (10 letters). What’s the word?
8. You have an 8-by-3-foot sheet of plywood, which you want to use for a 12-by-2-foot tabletop. How do you cut it into two pieces so it will fit the tabletop?
This article appears in Wide Open.