Puzzler of the week

[Scott MacLean]

This week's puzzler:

Two grasshoppers are hanging around, and each is boasting that he is faster than the other. To settle the argument, they decide to have a race.

The larger of the grasshoppers, Throckmorton -- or Throckie, as he's known -- can jump 10 inches at a single bound. The other grasshopper, Rocky, can jump only six inches at a shot. So the larger grasshopper says, "We're going to set up a racecourse that's 24 feet long: 12 feet out and 12 feet back."

They're each at the starting point.

Vinnie Goombatz-Hopper shoots the gun, and they take off.

Now, even though Throckie is the bigger guy and can jump 10 inches at a shot, Rocky jumps more often. So when they get to the five-foot mark -- which is 60 inches -- the big guy has jumped six times and the little guy has jumped 10 times, but they're dead even...neck and neck...antennae to antennae.

The question is: Which one wins the race, and why?

Last week's puzzler:

The composition of car parts has changed over the years. For example, the wheels of cars used to be made with wooden spokes. Then, they evolved into steel. Now, most wheels are made out of a magnesium-aluminum alloy. Dashboards used to be made out of wood, and now they're made out of steel. You get the point.

The puzzler is phrased as a, "What am I?" question. In other words, I'm going to tell you what "I" used to be made of -- and you're going to tell me what I am.

Here it is:

"In the early days of cars, I didn't even exist. When they saw a need for me, I was first made of wood. Later, when they discovered that that didn't work too well, I was made of leather. Some time later, I was made of cotton. Today, I am made of a mixture of things, including steel wool, iron, and bronze."

What am I?

Last week's puzzler answer:

For the purposes of obfuscation, I took a little poetic license and left out a few years of advances in automotive technology. You know, between the cotton and the next step. Well, I left out about 75 years.

But I if you listened carefully, I said "I am made out of a mixture of things, some of which are, and I didn't mention all of them, obviously, steel wool, iron, and bronze." Of course, I did leave out the bonding agent, the thing that holds those three components together, which is some kind of resin. And what all these things were, believe it or not, were brakes. The first cars did not have brakes. When they saw a need to stop the car, they actually used blocks of wood.

_______________________
Scott MacLean
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