Tie, Pin and Politics

We are approaching an important and fascinating week. Everything has already been said, shown or written about. Now it is just us and the ballot. Here is something playful to note about the candidates: their ties and pins.

First Presidential Debate:

Second Presidential Debate:

Third Presidential Debate:

Vice Presidential Debate:

What can you tell about the parties and candidates based on their tie and pin choices? Mathematically speaking, can you spot any peculiar patterns?

Your answers are accepted any time until midnight Eastern Time on Sunday, on our Family Puzzle Marathon.

Romney, Obama and Your Cup of Tea

We try to keep a tradition of celebrating everyone who wins 10 puzzle points on these ages with a puzzle. This week we are wrapping the Mathmover in our puzzle.

The Mathmover has been watching the Presidential debates on TV and sipping a tea with milk. More precisely, he started with a full cup of a strong tea to keep himself alert to any surprises on the TV.  He drunk one-sixth of the cup during the first two questions and added some milk to fill the cup.  By the time Presidential candidates went aggressive he finished one-third of his cup and re-filled it again with milk to keep calm.  Later on, when the heat picked up and candidates accused each other of lying, the Mathmover had only half-a-cup of liquid left and topped the cup again with milk to sooth himself toward the bedtime.

The question is whether his wife will have any milk left for her morning-after coffee if they only had a cup of milk left before the debate started.

Your answers are accepted any time until midnight Eastern Time on Sunday, on our Family Puzzle Marathon.

Image by fionaandneil, distributed under CCL.

White House Easter Egg Roll

Hundreds of lucky kids arrive every year to the White House Easter Egg Roll. Last year, a specially created commission decided to mark every egg with a number in order to keep track of them all. To avoid using ink, single digit stickers were purchased by this committee. All the eggs were marked with a unique number, using one or more stickers, numbers were assigned in an ascending order. For example, three stickers with digits 2, 4 and 5 were used to make 245. The White House Press Secretary was not at liberty to reveal how many eggs in total were used. Do you think the press can figure it out given that the total number of stickers purchased was 2893?

Submit your answer on our Family Puzzle Marathon Be first to solve three puzzles and get a prize!

Michelle Obama's Plane

Michelle Obama was returning from LA on a 747 and her White House Chief of Security planned to pick her at the airport in a special bulletproof car. Obama's plane landed ahead of schedule and the security chief unaware of it was still on his way. Michelle took a congressman's limousine back home. Fifteen minutes later security chief car intercepted the limousine on the way and asked the First Lady to switch cars. She was so happy to be back at the White House twenty minutes earlier than scheduled. When Washington chief of security had to file a day progress report, he was at loss as to when exactly the plane landed. The original schedule stated landing at 3.30pm. Can you help him?


This is a fictional story. The puzzle is adopted from the book by B. Kordemsky

Submit your answer on our Family Puzzle Marathon Be first to solve three puzzles and get a prize!

White House Party Crashers

A couple from Virginia breezed through the White House security and leisurely enjoyed the State Dinner with the president, vice-president, Indian Prime Minister and an array of other hand-picked guests. All is well, except that the couple has not even been invited to this dinner... Wow!
How did they do it? Rumor has it that the secret service agent asked them "Have you been invited?" They answered: "Yes!" and walked right in. While the Secret Service is trying to figure out how they let it happen, I suggest we help them with some logic. Our world consists of liars and truth tellers. The liars got entangled in their lies so deeply that they always lie, and the truth tellers are always honest. Both, liars and truth tellers, are occasionally being invited to White House parties. And both, liars and truth tellers, may occasionally have an impulse to attempt to crash a White House party uninvited. What question you suggest Secret Service agents ask any party goer, in order to let through only those invited, be it a liar or a truth teller?



(this puzzle is inspired by Giovanni Ciriani's answer to one of our recent puzzles)

To get a correct answer point, please explain your answer on our Family Puzzle Marathon site. Solve three puzzles and get a prize!

The Secret Meeting

At the recent UN meeting, president Obama decided to invite a number of other party leaders for a private meeting. No one knows who exactly and how many people were invited to this secret meeting, but rumor says it that a lot of handshaking was going on there. Every leader entering the meeting was approaching everyone already present in the room and shaking hands. Obama mused that something around 78 handshaking moments have happened at this meeting. How many people were invited?

Submit your answer on our Family Puzzle Marathon site. Solve three puzzles and get a prize!

White House Dinner

Three White House chefs can prepare sixty-person dinner in six hours. Two of the chefs caught a virus and had to stay at home. Will the remaining chef be able to prepare tonight's dinner for one hundred and twenty people all by himself?