Yardstick: A Triad of Puzzles

"It was all to be done in thirds." So begins Richard Brautigan's story "1/3, 1/3, 1/3."

A company that manufactures yardsticks has announced that it will not make them any longer. If you have a yardstick, you might want to use it to help you solve the triad of brainteasers below. Triad, by the way, a word meaning "a union or group of three usually closely related persons or things," can be formed from the letters of the word yardstick.

1. The sum of the digits of the number of inches in one third of a yard is 3. What three consecutive numbers add up to the number of inches in one third of a yard?
2. What three consecutive numbers add up to the number of inches in two thirds of a yard?
3. What three consecutive numbers add up to the number of inches in one yard?

The answers to these three brainteasers are below the following photo of a quotation from Joseph Brodsky:

Answers

1. The three consecutive numbers that add up to 12, the number of inches in one third of a yard, are 3, 4 and 5. Divide 12 by 3 and you get 4, the average between the three consecutive numbers. Subtract 1 from 4 for the number preceding it and add 1 to 4 for the number following it, and you have your three consecutive numbers.
2. The three consecutive numbers that add up to 24, the number of inches in two thirds of a yard, are 7, 8 and 9.
3. The three consecutive numbers that add up to 36, the number of inches in one yard (three feet), are 11, 12 and 13.

Why, God?

"In the middle of life's devastations," wrote Dr. Glenn Mollette recently, "we often look to God and ask why. If he is really so great, so good, and so loving then why would he send or allow eight or nine inches of rain to fall on the hollers of eastern Kentucky and sweep away little children? Did he go to sleep? Is he detached from what happens in the world? Is he really out there? Yet, as many grieve, they will fall upon God as he is all they have left to get them through. An old saint of God who suffered through the storms of life once said, 'I didn't realize God was all I needed until God was all I had.'"

"Our God is in sovereign control of all the events of this earth," wrote Charles R. Swindoll in 2002.

"Then how can I explain why bad things happen? How can I resolve the ringing question, 'Why, God?'

"I did not say our Father has explained Himself. . . . I said our Father has planned or permitted the events of this earth. He has no obligation to explain Himself. The Creator does not explain why to the created. It would be like a brilliant potter explaining himself to a mass of soft clay."

Then Job answered the LORD and said,

"I know that You can do all things,

And that no purpose of Yours can be thwarted."

New American Standard Bible: Job 42:1 

Lightning . . .

. . . and Rain

"Earth seems to hold her breath before the expected fury," wrote Celia Thaxter. "Lightning scores the sky from zenith to horizon, and across from north to south 'a fierce, vindictive scribble of fire' writes its blinding way, and the awesome silence is broken by the cracking thunder that follows every flash."

According to The 2022 Old Farmer's Almanac Weather Calendar, "When the thunder is more continuous than the lightning, there will be great winds."

In the New King James Version of the Bible, Psalm 135:5-7 reads:

For I know that the LORD is great,

And our Lord is above all gods.

Whatever the LORD pleases He does,

In heaven and in earth,

In the seas and in all deep places.

He causes the vapors to ascend from the ends of the earth;

He makes lightning for the rain;

He brings the wind out of His treasuries.

Man Does Not Live by Bread Alone

As God has shown us by turning stones to bread,

So we all must lend a helping hand.

     --from the song "We Are the World" by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie

Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And he fasted forty days and forty nights, and afterward he was hungry. And the tempter came and said to him, "If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread." But he answered, "It is written,

    'Man shall not live by bread alone,

     but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.'"

     --The Bible: Matthew 4:1-4 (Revised Standard Version)

Tremble, O earth, at the presence of the LORD,

    at the presence of the God of Jacob,

who turns the rock into a pool of water,

    the flint into a spring of water.

     --The Bible: Psalm 114:7-8 (Revised Standard Version)

Song of a Common Nightingale

"It is my experience that, when a nightingale starts singing," wrote William Henry Hudson, "the small birds near immediately become attentive, often suspending their own songs. And some fly to perch near him and listen."

To listen to an audio recording of the song of a common nightingale, click on the word nightingale in the quotation above. That audio recording is available below a photo of the bird in the Wikipedia article about the common nightingale.

 William Henry Hudson (1841-1922)

What Will Be Left

Poet Deron Eckert, who lives in Lexington, Kentucky, wrote his poem "What Will Be Left" in response to last week's "historic flooding in eastern Kentucky, an area that has already lost so much . . . " To read "What Will Be Left" and to listen to a recording of Deron Eckert reading his poem, click here.