The Sphinx's Lair

12:35 AM

@Stiv hehh

CCCC: Restaurant originally keeping donuts? (4)

12:50 AM

@oAlt _t ori_ (donuts)

@juicifer yep :D

CCCC: Someone who leaves delivery for university (6)

Q: Pawn Or Bust, Save The Game

1:20 AM

Catastrophe! During a last-minute mad scramble, a White pawn was struck off the board into oblivion. Neither player can remember where to place it. The piece count is looking bad for Black. Additionally, White is threatening a mate in one. Two things may save Black yet. White has only a few seco...

2 hours later…

3:11 AM

@juicifer there's an EXETER university, which is a homophone of "exitor"

ugh, finally got home from vacation... departed from finland on wednesday, just arrived home now on saturday

(apparently the word for someone who leaves is exiter, not exitor... my bad)

4:02 AM

@Jafe you got it

2 hours later…

Q: The math teacher's cipher puzzle

5:37 AM

Yesterday, my math teacher gave an email to the whole class. He said: 'I am giving the class a puzzle, and you will have the rest of the month to finish it. Wwhoever can solve gets a prize. Hint: This is meme-related. 80+4 1710/15 117+4 384/12 116.0*1 1352/13 114-9 55.0*2 94+13 26.25*4 91+19 10.3...

mathematics logical-deduction cipher

1 hour later…

6:46 AM

yikes, and now i have no clues prepared... amateur hour here in the lair

7:19 AM

Q: a color-coded sentence

The puzzle is self-contained in the image below. The answer is a three-words sentence. Here is a transcript of the image: for each cell the UPPERCASE letter represents the background color, the lowercase letter is the content of the cell. UPPERCASE letters meaning: B(blue) G(green) K(black) O(o...

enigmatic-puzzle

1 hour later…

8:38 AM

CCCC: A city whose name rhymes with luge, inhabited by many, containing zoo centre but no sea bank (5,5)

9:11 AM

Oh man, this seems like an &lit.: BRUGES (Belgian city which Wikipedia implies rhymes with "luge") inhabited by A TON, containing O (zoo center) but no S (sea bank) = B(A TON)R(O)UGE. To complete the explanation, Baton Rouge also rhymes with "luge", is inhabited by ~227K people and counting, and contains the Baton Rouge Zoo but is not close to the sea.

@Jafe

spot on

Q: yet another card payoff game

9:27 AM

A casino offers yet another card game with the standard 52 cards (26 red, 26 black). The cards are thoroughly shuffled and the dealer draws cards one by one. (Drawn cards are not returned to the deck.) You can ask the dealer to stop at any time you like. For each red card drawn, you win \$1; for ...

mathematics probability

CCCC: Wrong time to enter... Messed up, done for, forcing chief to hide in an adjacent house (4, 4)

4 hours later…

Q: Is there way to solve this minesweeper without guessing?

1:43 PM

I have arrived at this board and I'm kinda stuck. Is there any way to continue without guessing?

minesweeper

Q: Height debate between mother and daughter

2:08 PM

Given a mother who's very tall, on average, what could you expect the height of her daughter to be? Shorter, equal or taller? Source: https://www.indeed.com/career-advice/interviewing/probability-interview-questions I have no clue whatsoever, how can a daughter's height be determined completely b...

mathematics probability

bobble

2:18 PM

The edit here feels like an entirely new question which should be sure separately, not just a clarification. Thoughts?

603

Q: Exit strategies for "chameleon questions"

I'm not sure if there's already an existing term for this, so I'm inventing my own. (tl;dr: I call them "chameleon questions" because they change every time you submit or edit an answer. If you're already intimately familiar with the phenomenon, please skip past the first set of bullet points to...

discussion questions new-users new-questions multiple-questions

AncientSwordRage

2:36 PM

@bobble yeah I'm really confused by that edit

AncientSwordRage

3:13 PM

@oAlt I keep starting to write out an answer then rethinking

4:09 PM

@oAlt NEXT DOOR (in an adjacent house) = X (wrong) + T (time) both in DONE(-f)OR* where the F being removed is F(-orcing)

Q: allocation of infinity

Suppose you have a hotel which has one floor with infinite number of rooms in a row and all of them are occupied. A new customer wants to check in, how will you accommodate her? What if infinite number of people want to check in, how will you accommodate them? Suppose infinite number of buses ar...

mathematics probability

4:24 PM

@Stiv I don't know why I didn't get notified of this tag, but you're correct!

@oAlt Maybe you were out so the system left it with a neighbour...

Heh

Question: can a person with less than 3k rep see the usernames of the people who voted to close their question?

Pass

knowledge enigmatic-puzzle visual

4:42 PM

Q: The perfect heatmap

Forget about these: I just found the perfect one. Can you explain why I think the below heatmap is perfect?

Frick it, just laid a close vote. Better safe than sorry, question might indeed be actual homework

CCCC: Yours truly, gulping a lager, and uneasy about my flipping woman (who some people say may have been a prostitute) (4,9)

^ NB Not a true story.

Imagine it being voiced by a pub drunk.

5:48 PM

@Stiv ME gulping ALAGERAND* about MY< = MARY MAGDALENE

@juicifer Indeed. Probably deserves a clue about her faith rather than her (likely incorrect) reputation, so I offer her my apologies - the surface was too tempting...

6:01 PM

CCCC: Constant rumors surrounding violent outburst (7)

5 hours later…

10:31 PM

@juicifer TANTRUM = _TANT RUM_ (def=violent outburst)