Three Men And The Waiter



Three men in a cafe order a meal the total cost of which is $15. They each contribute $5.

The waiter takes the money to the chef who recognizes the three as friends and asks the waiter to return $5 to the men.

The waiter is not only poor at mathematics but dishonest and instead of going to the trouble of splitting the $5 between the three he simply gives them $1 each and pockets the remaining $2 for himself.

Now, each of the men effectively paid $4, the total paid is therefore $12. Add the $2 in the waiters pocket and this comes to $14.

Where has the other $1 gone from the original $15?

Ah! Click here to read the solution.

The payments should equal the receipts. It does not make sense to add what was paid by the men ($12) to what was received from that payment by the waiter ($2)

Although the initial bill was $15 dollars, one of the five dollar notes gets changed into five ones.

The total the three men ultimately paid is $12, as they get three ones back.

So from the $12 the men paid, the owner receives $10 and the waiter receives the $2 difference. $15 – $3 = $10 + $2.



The Wife And The Husband At Five



Every day, a wife picks up her husband at train station at 5.

One day he arrives early at 4 and he begins to walk home along the road which his wife would be travelling.

She meets him and takes him the rest of the way. If he would have waited at the train station, she would have arrived there at 5.

As it turned out, they reached home 20 minutes early.

What time was it when she picked him up

Ah! Click here to read the solution.

At 4:50.

If they made it home 20 minutes early, then the trip was 20 minutes shorter.

Then it was 10 minutes shorter going, and 10 minutes shorter coming back home.

Since it was 10 minutes shorter going, then she picked him up at 10 till 5:00, or 4:50. 🙂