Monday, March 31, 2008
Puzzle # 3: The tennis game
Four people are about to play a tennis game.
1. The four people are Mr. and Mrs. Jones and Mr and Mrs. Smith.
2. The worst player is directly across the net from the better Jones player.
3. The better male player is diagonally across the net from the poorer Smith player.
4. The poorer male and the better female player are on the same side of the net.
Who is the best player?
Please send me your answers on greatrahul.jagtap@gmail.com . The names of the people who solve these puzzles will be posted here. Also do send me any puzzles you may have.
Solved By: Rahul Jagtap, Swapna Sasi, Nidhi Kadam, Kalpana Jagtap
Thursday, March 20, 2008
Numbers Trivia
The first 4 alphabets of the English alphabet, namely 'a', ' b', 'c' &'d',which are quite commonly used, do not appear anywhere in the spelling of any of the numbers from "One" to "Ninety Nine"!
The alphabet 'd' appears for the first time in the spelling of the number "Hundred"
The alphabets 'a', ' b' & 'c' do not appear anywhere in the spelling of any of the numbers from "One" to "Nine Hundred Ninety Nine"!
The alphabet 'a' appears for the first time in the spelling of the number "Thousand"
The alphabets ' b' & 'c' do not appear anywhere in the spelling of any of the numbers from 1 to 999,999,999!
The alphabet 'b' appears for the first time in the spelling of the number "Billion"
And finally,
The alphabet 'c' does not appear in the spelling of any number!
The alphabet 'd' appears for the first time in the spelling of the number "Hundred"
The alphabets 'a', ' b' & 'c' do not appear anywhere in the spelling of any of the numbers from "One" to "Nine Hundred Ninety Nine"!
The alphabet 'a' appears for the first time in the spelling of the number "Thousand"
The alphabets ' b' & 'c' do not appear anywhere in the spelling of any of the numbers from 1 to 999,999,999!
The alphabet 'b' appears for the first time in the spelling of the number "Billion"
And finally,
The alphabet 'c' does not appear in the spelling of any number!
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Book Review # 1 : Engaging India - Strobe Talbott
Excellent book which gives insight into behind the scenes talk between countries. A very good peek into diplomacy between India and U.S especially after India conducted the Nuclear Tests in May 1998. The book also details the role played by US during the Kargil conflict. The US pressure on Nawaz Sharif at the time of the Kargil crisis is well told in all its brutal frankness.
A must read for all you political history lovers.
A must read for all you political history lovers.
The essence of the book lies in the fascinating account of how relations between the most powerful democracy and the most populous, were turned around through a process of interaction between two highly competent interlocutors.
Puzzle # 2 : The Murder in a Mansion
The owner of a mansion was murdered. The visitors to the mansion were Allen, Bixby and Crain.
1. The murderer, who was one of the three visitors, arrived at the mansion later than at least one of the other two visitors.
2. A detective, who was one of the three visitors, arrived at the mansion earlier than at least one of the other two visitors.
3. The detective arrived at the mansion at midnight.
4. Neither Allen nor Bixby arrived at the mansion after midnight.
5. The earlier arriver of Bixby and Crain was not the detective.
6. The later arriver of Allen and Crain was not the murderer.
Who was the murderer?
Please send me your answers on greatrahul.jagtap@gmail.com . The names of the people who solve these puzzles will be posted here. Also do send me any puzzles you may have.
Solved By: Rahul Jagtap, Varsha Baikar, Earl D'Cunha, Manoj Asaithambi, Nidhi Kadam
1. The murderer, who was one of the three visitors, arrived at the mansion later than at least one of the other two visitors.
2. A detective, who was one of the three visitors, arrived at the mansion earlier than at least one of the other two visitors.
3. The detective arrived at the mansion at midnight.
4. Neither Allen nor Bixby arrived at the mansion after midnight.
5. The earlier arriver of Bixby and Crain was not the detective.
6. The later arriver of Allen and Crain was not the murderer.
Who was the murderer?
Please send me your answers on greatrahul.jagtap@gmail.com . The names of the people who solve these puzzles will be posted here. Also do send me any puzzles you may have.
Solved By: Rahul Jagtap, Varsha Baikar, Earl D'Cunha, Manoj Asaithambi, Nidhi Kadam
Puzzle # 1 : A Self-Descrbing number
Find a 10-digit number that describes itself. The first digit will be the numbers of 1's in the number, the second digit will be the number of 2's, and so forth, through the ninth digit. The tenth digit will be the number of 0's.
I have solved it. Check out my name on the website http://www.contestcen.com/digits.htm
Please send me your answers on greatrahul.jagtap@gmail.com . The names of the people who solve these puzzles will be posted here. Also do send me any puzzles you may have.
Solved By: Rahul Jagtap, Earl D'Cunha, Sunil Swami, Nidhi Kadam, Ky Justiniani (24Dec09), Shanaya Jagtap(Sep2023)
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
Calvin n Hobbes # 1
Calvin and Hobbes:
Attitude -- You know what we need, Hobbes? We need an attitude. Yeah, you can't be cool if you don't have an attitude.
--Calvin
Best Friend -- Things are never quite as scary when you've got a best friend.
--Calvin
Enjoy Where We Are -- Sometimes it seems things go by too quickly. We are so busy watching out for what's just ahead of us that we don't take the time to enjoy where we
are.
-- Calvin
HW or Snow -- I should be doing my homework now. But the way I see it, playing in the snow is a lot more important. Out here I'm learning skills that I can apply throughout the rest of my life - procrastinating and rationalizing.
-- Calvin
Job Badly Enough -- If you do a job badly enough, sometimes you don't get asked to do it again.
-- Calvin
Killing Time -- I'm killing time while I wait for life to shower me with meaning and happiness.
-- Calvin
Lucky Underpants -- You know, Hobbes, some days even my lucky rocketship underpants don't help.
-- Calvin
Mind Wander -- I let my mind wander and it didn't come back.
-- Calvin
Never Die -- I was put on this earth to accomplish a certain number of things. Right now I'm so far behind I will never die.
-- Calvin
What I Want to Know: I go to school, but I never learn what I want to know.
-- Calvin
Principles: I don't need to compromise my principles, because they don't have the slightest bearing on what happens to me anyway.
-- Calvin
Reality -- Reality continues to ruin my life.
-- Calvin
Stories With No Point -- I'd hate to think that all my current experiences will someday become stories with no point.
-- Calvin
Tests -- I understand my tests are popular reading in the teachers' lounge.
-- Calvin
Weekends -- Weekends don't count unless you spend them doing something completely pointless.
-- Calvin
Work for Everything -- Why should I have to work for everything? It's like saying that I don't deserve it.
-- Calvin
Writing -- I used to hate writing assignments, but now I enjoy them. I realized that the purpose of writing is to inflate weak ideas, obscure poor reasoning and inhibit clarity. With a little practice, writing can be an intimidating and impenetrable fog!
-- Calvin
Dream -- I think we dream so we don't have to be apart so long. If we're in each others dreams, we can play together all night!
-- Hobbes
Smug -- The real fun of living wisely is that you get to be smug about it.
--Hobbes
Childhood is Short -- Childhood is short and maturity is forever.
-- Calvin
No Adventure -- I haven't had any adventures! My life has been one big bore from the beginning.
-- Calvin
It’s Sunday -- It's Sunday. I've just got a few precious hours of freedom left before I have to go to school tomorrow.
-- Calvin
Greatest Man -- -I've been thinking. Suppose I grow up to be one of the world's greatest men of all time. Suppose my name will be an inspiration to humanity for eons to come.
-- Calvin
Hiccup Cures -- I think most hiccup cures were really invented for the amusement of the patient's friends.
-- Hobbes
Jelly Doughnuts -- Jelly doughnuts gross me out. They're like eating giant, squishy bugs. You bite into them and all their purple guts spill out the other end.
-- Calvin
Dog-Eat-Dog World -- It's a dog-eat-dog world, so I'll do whatever I have to, and let others argue whether it’s "right" or not.
-- Calvin
Jungle out of Tiger -- You can take the tiger out of the jungle, but you can't take the jungle out of the tiger.
-- Hobbes
Super Genius -- People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world.
-- Calvin
Only Human -- The problem with people is that they are only human.
-- Hobbes
Stupendous Man -- Yes! It's ... Stupendous Man! Friend of freedom! Opponent of oppression! Lover of liberty!
-- Stupendous Man
Rudeness and Disrespect -- A little rudeness and disrespect can elevate a meaningless interaction to a battle of
wills and add drama to an otherwise dull day.
-- Calvin
Green Knees -- I say, if your knees aren't green by the end of the day, you ought to seriously re-examine your life.
-- Calvin
Skills Patient to Learn -- The only skills I have the patience to learn are those that have no real application in life.
-- Calvin
Nothing You Want -- There's never enough time to do all the nothing you want.
-- Calvin
Intelligent Life -- Sometimes I think the surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is that none of it has tried to contact us.
-- Calvin
Up to Something -- People pay more attention to you when they think you're up to something.
-- Calvin
Not Responsible -- Life is a lot more fun when you're not responsible for your actions.
-- Calvin
Bad Day Worse -- To make a bad day worse, spend it wishing for the impossible.
-- Calvin
10 Seconds -- If something is so complicated that you can't explain it in 10 seconds, then it's probably not worth knowing anyway.
-- Calvin
Never Children -- People who get nostalgic about childhood were obviously never children.
-- Calvin
Make Me Care -- You can present the material, but you can't make me care.
-- Calvin
Reality I Accept -- It's not denial. I'm just selective about the reality I accept.
-- Calvin
Common Sense -- I've got plenty of common sense! I just choose to ignore it.
-- Calvin
Peace with the World -- I'm at peace with the world. I'm completely serene. I've discovered my purpose in life. I know why I was put here and why everything exists... I am here so everybody can do what I want. Once everybody accepts it, they'll be serene too.
-- Calvin
Price So Low -- I don't know which is worse... that everyone has his price, or that the price is always so low.
-- Hobbes
Minute At College -- Everytime you make a deposit, you can think, "Oh boy, another two minutes at college."
-- Calvin’s Dad
Blame Things -- It's a lot more fun to blame things than to fix them.
-- Calvin
Airplane -- When you think how well basic appliances work, it's hard to believe anyone ever gets on an airplane.
-- Calvin
Coexist -- It's hard to co-exist with things that want to kill you.
Mail -- The longer you wait for the mail, the less there is of it.
-- Calvin
Vicariously Living -- Dad are you vicariously living through me in the hope that my accomplishments will validate your mediocre life and in some way compensate for all the opportunities you botched?
-- Calvin
Girls and Bugs -- I imagine girls and bugs have a dim perception that nature played a cruel trick on them but they lack the intelligence to really comprehend the
magnitude of it.
-- Calvin
Girls Go On Living -- It must be awful to be a girl. I'm sure it's frustrating knowing that men are bigger, stronger and better at abstract thought than women.
Really, if you are a girl, what would make you go on living?
-- Calvin
Bed Poem -- At night my mind does not much care
If what it thinks is here or there.
It tells me stories it invents
And makes up things that don't make sense.
I don't know why it does this stuff.
The real world seems quite weird enough.
-- Calvin
Bed Poem (2) -- Now I'm in bed,
The sheets pulled to my head.
My tiger is here making Zs.
He's furry and hot.
He takes up a lot
Of the bed and he's hogging the breeze.
-- Calvin
Behavior is Addictive -- My behavior is addictive functioning in a disease process of toxic co-dependency. I need holistic healing and wellness before I'll
accept any responsibility for my actions.
-- Calvin
Calamity -- Often it takes some calamity to make us live in the present. Then
suddenly we wake up and see all the mistakes we have made. But it is too
late to change anything.
-- Calvin
Van Gogh -- Van Gogh would've sold more than one painting if he put tigers in them.
-- Hobbes
Life can Get Worse -- That's one of the remarkable things about life. It's never so bad that it can't get worse
-- Calvin
Good Compromise -- A good compromise leaves everybody mad.
-- Calvin
Essence of the Male Mind -- Idiocy is the essence of the male mind.
-- Calvin
Laugh at Senselessness -- I suppose if we couldn’t laugh at things that don’t make sense, we couldn’t react to a lot of life.
-- Calvin
Humor -- In humor, timing is everything
-- Calvin
Complete Pandemonium -- Do the words 'complete pandemonium' strike terror in your heart?"
-- Calvin
Have Something -- When you get something, it's new and exciting. When you have something, you take it for granted and it's boring.
-- Calvin
Calvinball Poem -- Other kids' games are all such a bore!
They gotta have rules and they gotta keep score!
Calvinball is better by far!
It's never the same! It's always bizarre!
You don't need a team or a referee!
You know that it's great cause it's named after me!
-- Calvin
Resource Consuming Kid -- I'm yet another resource-consuming kid in and overpopulated planet, raised to an alarming extent by Madison Avenue and Hollywood, poised with my cynical and alienated peers to take over the world when you're old and weak.
-- Calvin
Calvinball -- Get out the time-fracture wickets, Hobbes! We're gonna play Calvinball!
-- Calvin
How Things Oughta Be -- Nobody asks me how things oughta be! I've got tons of ideas!
-- Calvin
Lemons -- I say, when life gives you a lemon, wing it right back and add some lemons of your own!
-- Calvin
Wishful Thinking -- I guess there's no harm in a little wishful thinking.
-- Hobbes
Interesting Times -- These are interesting times. We don't trust the government, we don't trust the legal system, we don't trust the media, and we don't trust each other! We've undermined all authority, and with it, the basis for replacing it! It's like a six-year-old's dream come true!
-- Calvin
Bitter and Cynical -- Now, a lifetime of experience has left me bitter and cynical.
-- Calvin
Warped Values -- If warped values are the price of a vicarious thrill, so be it!
-- Calvin
Whims into Principles -- Some people are pragmatists, taking things as they come and making the best of the choices available. Some people are idealists, standing for principle and refusing to compromise. And some people just act on any whim that enters their heads. I pragmatically turn my whims into principles!
-- Calvin
Cannobilism -- Miss Wormwood, could we arrange our seats in a little circle and have a little discussion? Specifically, I'd like to debate whether cannibalism ought to be grounds for leniency in murders since it is less wasteful.
-- Calvin
Ignorance is Bliss -- If ignorance is bliss, this lesson would appear to be a deliberate attempt on your part to deprive me of happiness, the pursuit of which is my unalienable right according to the declaration of independence. I therefore assert my patriotic prerogative not to know this material. I'll be out in the playground.
n Calvin
Attitude -- You know what we need, Hobbes? We need an attitude. Yeah, you can't be cool if you don't have an attitude.
--Calvin
Best Friend -- Things are never quite as scary when you've got a best friend.
--Calvin
Enjoy Where We Are -- Sometimes it seems things go by too quickly. We are so busy watching out for what's just ahead of us that we don't take the time to enjoy where we
are.
-- Calvin
HW or Snow -- I should be doing my homework now. But the way I see it, playing in the snow is a lot more important. Out here I'm learning skills that I can apply throughout the rest of my life - procrastinating and rationalizing.
-- Calvin
Job Badly Enough -- If you do a job badly enough, sometimes you don't get asked to do it again.
-- Calvin
Killing Time -- I'm killing time while I wait for life to shower me with meaning and happiness.
-- Calvin
Lucky Underpants -- You know, Hobbes, some days even my lucky rocketship underpants don't help.
-- Calvin
Mind Wander -- I let my mind wander and it didn't come back.
-- Calvin
Never Die -- I was put on this earth to accomplish a certain number of things. Right now I'm so far behind I will never die.
-- Calvin
What I Want to Know: I go to school, but I never learn what I want to know.
-- Calvin
Principles: I don't need to compromise my principles, because they don't have the slightest bearing on what happens to me anyway.
-- Calvin
Reality -- Reality continues to ruin my life.
-- Calvin
Stories With No Point -- I'd hate to think that all my current experiences will someday become stories with no point.
-- Calvin
Tests -- I understand my tests are popular reading in the teachers' lounge.
-- Calvin
Weekends -- Weekends don't count unless you spend them doing something completely pointless.
-- Calvin
Work for Everything -- Why should I have to work for everything? It's like saying that I don't deserve it.
-- Calvin
Writing -- I used to hate writing assignments, but now I enjoy them. I realized that the purpose of writing is to inflate weak ideas, obscure poor reasoning and inhibit clarity. With a little practice, writing can be an intimidating and impenetrable fog!
-- Calvin
Dream -- I think we dream so we don't have to be apart so long. If we're in each others dreams, we can play together all night!
-- Hobbes
Smug -- The real fun of living wisely is that you get to be smug about it.
--Hobbes
Childhood is Short -- Childhood is short and maturity is forever.
-- Calvin
No Adventure -- I haven't had any adventures! My life has been one big bore from the beginning.
-- Calvin
It’s Sunday -- It's Sunday. I've just got a few precious hours of freedom left before I have to go to school tomorrow.
-- Calvin
Greatest Man -- -I've been thinking. Suppose I grow up to be one of the world's greatest men of all time. Suppose my name will be an inspiration to humanity for eons to come.
-- Calvin
Hiccup Cures -- I think most hiccup cures were really invented for the amusement of the patient's friends.
-- Hobbes
Jelly Doughnuts -- Jelly doughnuts gross me out. They're like eating giant, squishy bugs. You bite into them and all their purple guts spill out the other end.
-- Calvin
Dog-Eat-Dog World -- It's a dog-eat-dog world, so I'll do whatever I have to, and let others argue whether it’s "right" or not.
-- Calvin
Jungle out of Tiger -- You can take the tiger out of the jungle, but you can't take the jungle out of the tiger.
-- Hobbes
Super Genius -- People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world.
-- Calvin
Only Human -- The problem with people is that they are only human.
-- Hobbes
Stupendous Man -- Yes! It's ... Stupendous Man! Friend of freedom! Opponent of oppression! Lover of liberty!
-- Stupendous Man
Rudeness and Disrespect -- A little rudeness and disrespect can elevate a meaningless interaction to a battle of
wills and add drama to an otherwise dull day.
-- Calvin
Green Knees -- I say, if your knees aren't green by the end of the day, you ought to seriously re-examine your life.
-- Calvin
Skills Patient to Learn -- The only skills I have the patience to learn are those that have no real application in life.
-- Calvin
Nothing You Want -- There's never enough time to do all the nothing you want.
-- Calvin
Intelligent Life -- Sometimes I think the surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is that none of it has tried to contact us.
-- Calvin
Up to Something -- People pay more attention to you when they think you're up to something.
-- Calvin
Not Responsible -- Life is a lot more fun when you're not responsible for your actions.
-- Calvin
Bad Day Worse -- To make a bad day worse, spend it wishing for the impossible.
-- Calvin
10 Seconds -- If something is so complicated that you can't explain it in 10 seconds, then it's probably not worth knowing anyway.
-- Calvin
Never Children -- People who get nostalgic about childhood were obviously never children.
-- Calvin
Make Me Care -- You can present the material, but you can't make me care.
-- Calvin
Reality I Accept -- It's not denial. I'm just selective about the reality I accept.
-- Calvin
Common Sense -- I've got plenty of common sense! I just choose to ignore it.
-- Calvin
Peace with the World -- I'm at peace with the world. I'm completely serene. I've discovered my purpose in life. I know why I was put here and why everything exists... I am here so everybody can do what I want. Once everybody accepts it, they'll be serene too.
-- Calvin
Price So Low -- I don't know which is worse... that everyone has his price, or that the price is always so low.
-- Hobbes
Minute At College -- Everytime you make a deposit, you can think, "Oh boy, another two minutes at college."
-- Calvin’s Dad
Blame Things -- It's a lot more fun to blame things than to fix them.
-- Calvin
Airplane -- When you think how well basic appliances work, it's hard to believe anyone ever gets on an airplane.
-- Calvin
Coexist -- It's hard to co-exist with things that want to kill you.
Mail -- The longer you wait for the mail, the less there is of it.
-- Calvin
Vicariously Living -- Dad are you vicariously living through me in the hope that my accomplishments will validate your mediocre life and in some way compensate for all the opportunities you botched?
-- Calvin
Girls and Bugs -- I imagine girls and bugs have a dim perception that nature played a cruel trick on them but they lack the intelligence to really comprehend the
magnitude of it.
-- Calvin
Girls Go On Living -- It must be awful to be a girl. I'm sure it's frustrating knowing that men are bigger, stronger and better at abstract thought than women.
Really, if you are a girl, what would make you go on living?
-- Calvin
Bed Poem -- At night my mind does not much care
If what it thinks is here or there.
It tells me stories it invents
And makes up things that don't make sense.
I don't know why it does this stuff.
The real world seems quite weird enough.
-- Calvin
Bed Poem (2) -- Now I'm in bed,
The sheets pulled to my head.
My tiger is here making Zs.
He's furry and hot.
He takes up a lot
Of the bed and he's hogging the breeze.
-- Calvin
Behavior is Addictive -- My behavior is addictive functioning in a disease process of toxic co-dependency. I need holistic healing and wellness before I'll
accept any responsibility for my actions.
-- Calvin
Calamity -- Often it takes some calamity to make us live in the present. Then
suddenly we wake up and see all the mistakes we have made. But it is too
late to change anything.
-- Calvin
Van Gogh -- Van Gogh would've sold more than one painting if he put tigers in them.
-- Hobbes
Life can Get Worse -- That's one of the remarkable things about life. It's never so bad that it can't get worse
-- Calvin
Good Compromise -- A good compromise leaves everybody mad.
-- Calvin
Essence of the Male Mind -- Idiocy is the essence of the male mind.
-- Calvin
Laugh at Senselessness -- I suppose if we couldn’t laugh at things that don’t make sense, we couldn’t react to a lot of life.
-- Calvin
Humor -- In humor, timing is everything
-- Calvin
Complete Pandemonium -- Do the words 'complete pandemonium' strike terror in your heart?"
-- Calvin
Have Something -- When you get something, it's new and exciting. When you have something, you take it for granted and it's boring.
-- Calvin
Calvinball Poem -- Other kids' games are all such a bore!
They gotta have rules and they gotta keep score!
Calvinball is better by far!
It's never the same! It's always bizarre!
You don't need a team or a referee!
You know that it's great cause it's named after me!
-- Calvin
Resource Consuming Kid -- I'm yet another resource-consuming kid in and overpopulated planet, raised to an alarming extent by Madison Avenue and Hollywood, poised with my cynical and alienated peers to take over the world when you're old and weak.
-- Calvin
Calvinball -- Get out the time-fracture wickets, Hobbes! We're gonna play Calvinball!
-- Calvin
How Things Oughta Be -- Nobody asks me how things oughta be! I've got tons of ideas!
-- Calvin
Lemons -- I say, when life gives you a lemon, wing it right back and add some lemons of your own!
-- Calvin
Wishful Thinking -- I guess there's no harm in a little wishful thinking.
-- Hobbes
Interesting Times -- These are interesting times. We don't trust the government, we don't trust the legal system, we don't trust the media, and we don't trust each other! We've undermined all authority, and with it, the basis for replacing it! It's like a six-year-old's dream come true!
-- Calvin
Bitter and Cynical -- Now, a lifetime of experience has left me bitter and cynical.
-- Calvin
Warped Values -- If warped values are the price of a vicarious thrill, so be it!
-- Calvin
Whims into Principles -- Some people are pragmatists, taking things as they come and making the best of the choices available. Some people are idealists, standing for principle and refusing to compromise. And some people just act on any whim that enters their heads. I pragmatically turn my whims into principles!
-- Calvin
Cannobilism -- Miss Wormwood, could we arrange our seats in a little circle and have a little discussion? Specifically, I'd like to debate whether cannibalism ought to be grounds for leniency in murders since it is less wasteful.
-- Calvin
Ignorance is Bliss -- If ignorance is bliss, this lesson would appear to be a deliberate attempt on your part to deprive me of happiness, the pursuit of which is my unalienable right according to the declaration of independence. I therefore assert my patriotic prerogative not to know this material. I'll be out in the playground.
n Calvin
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)