Mellor’s Garden
April 21st 2006
Today’s Brainteaser.
Old Mellor bought his garden many years ago and got it dirt cheap, probably because it was in the shape of a trapezium. The two diagonals of the trapezium divide the garden into four triangles each for vegetables, fruit, flowers and lawn. Mellor remembers that the area of each triangle is a whole number of square yards, that the lawn is 80 square yards in area, and that the vegetable garden is 45 Square yards in area.
Question. What the fuck is a trapezium?
Answers in the Comments section please. 10 pounds for the first correct answer. The editor’s decision is final.
Answer to last week’s (April 14th) Brainteaser – Barearse.
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There are two common definitions of the trapezium. The American definition is a quadrilateral with no parallel sides. The British definition for a trapezium is a quadrilateral with two sides parallel (Bronshtein and Semendyayev 1977, p. 174). Such a trapezium is equivalent to a trapezoid and therefore has area
A=1/2(a+b)h
There you go. Simple.
I have now lost the will to live and my brain hurts. I require a stiff vodka forthwith to recover.
Please don’t do that to us again. Please.
Comment by Four Dinners — April 21, 2006 @ 11:31 am
I thought a trapezium was where Trappist monks worked-out.
Comment by Canute — April 22, 2006 @ 1:38 am
I always thought a trapezium was a place you kept trapezes.
Comment by helena — April 22, 2006 @ 3:10 am
and there was i thinking a trapezium was four ropes suspended over a garden, each leading to a separate corner. trapeze artists would then do amazing stunts on the trapezes and meet up in the middle.
i guess i’m not always right.
Comment by zed — April 22, 2006 @ 3:12 am
Four Dinners has won the ten pounds. I don’t know if the answer is correct but even if it’s bullshit it’s impressive bullshit. So if he could let me know where he wants me to send the ten pounds of used teabags I’ll post them on.
Comment by Razzamatazz — April 22, 2006 @ 11:55 am