From: Befuddled <walter at nova.org>
To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at keithlynch.net>
Date: Tue, 05 Mar 2002 14:03:32 -0400
Subject: [WSFA] Re: Math question
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at keithlynch.net>

Hello Steve

On 05-Mar-02, Steve Smith wrote:
...
SS> Now one for you.  Assume you have a checkerboard and a bunch of
SS> dominoes.  Each domino exactly covers two squares on the checkerboard.
SS> You can cover the entire checkerboard with 32 dominoes.

SS> Now, remove the lower left square and the upper right square on the
SS> checkerboard.  How do you arrange 31 dominoes to cover the remaining
SS> squares?

Well, this is really cheating, but...

Pick out a 6x6 block that includes, say, the lower right corner
of the board.  That's easy to cover with 18 dominoes.  Now you
have a kindofa funny chevron of uncovered squares (seven on the
outermost row and eight on the second, viewed from the left or
from the top.  So lay the remaining 13 dominoes diagonally on
those squares, the long dimension of each domino pointing from
upper left to lower right.

God, that took me a long time.  I shouldna dropped outta
high school.

Be seeing you,

Befuddled

P.S.  Thanks to Barry for getting me out of Karachi's
time zone.