In case you were starting to feel confident, this one was meant for third graders in Vietnam. The answer is 66, but we don't blame you for scratching your head about how they got there.
A monk has a very specific ritual for climbing up the steps to the temple. First, he climbs up to the middle step and meditates for 1 minute. Then he climbs up 8 steps and faces east until he hears a bird singing. Then he walks down 12 steps and picks up a pebble. He takes one step up and tosses the pebble over his left shoulder. Now, he walks up the remaining steps three at a time which only takes him 9 paces. How many steps are there?
On the dull night when the blonde was dozing, she heard an odd clamour and she saw that there was a bizarre man with a gun simply outside her home. So she raced to the telephone to call the police, however, she can't dial 911. Why?
The day before the 1996 U.S. presidential election, the NYT Crossword contained the clue “Lead story in tomorrow’s newspaper,” the puzzle was built so that both electoral outcomes were correct answers, requiring 7 other clues to have dual responses.