The man who returned had arranged the trip. The arrangement was for a round-trip (to and fro), but he booked the second part (return) for himself only. (Such an ‘odd’ arrangement might raise a flag at the time of booking itself, but he could have played it down saying something like his friend will not be returning with him as he (friend) would be going elsewhere, breaking the trip after the first part. But when the travel agent learned about the death, he knew that the man in question had planned to send his friend “elsewhere” at the time of booking itself.

First answer: My eyes. Because, as per the puzzle statement, I am sleeping. And, as a matter of fact, I don’t sleep with my eyes open…!

However, given the details, I have a counter-point: If I am sleeping, how do I know that they (the visitors) have bread, jam, honey, juice, milk… all these items with them? I can know this information only after I get up (open my eyes) and open the door and see the aforesaid items in their possession. That means, by the time have reached the last line of the puzzle, I have already opened TWO things. So, the question of “what do you open first” is already ‘dead’…! And once I know the items they have, it’s purely choice – either mine or theirs – whether to open any of these items in question or to open something else that I have at home. ‘The odds are even’…!

Repeat of an already repeated puzzle…?!

Question: “Where is white house ?”

Answer: It can be ANYWHERE…!

But if the question was “Where is ‘The White House‘, the answer would be “Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC, USA“

Mario is the Engineer, Charlie the Co-pilot and Dan is the Pilot.

Working out:

Statements:

1. The copilot, who is the only child, earns the least.
2. Mario, who married Dan’s sister, earns more than the pilot

(a) From (2), Dan has a sister, which means he’s NOT the co-pilot (because the co-pilot is an only child, from (1)).
(b) Further, Since Mario earns more than the pilot, he also CAN’T be the co-pilot (because, as per (1), co-pilot earns the least.)

From (a) and (b) above, Charlie is the only possible candidate for copilot post.
Now, the only remaining persons are Mario and Dan, and the remaining posts are pilot and engineer.

Since, as per (2) Mario earns more than the pilot, he can’t be the pilot, which means that he is the Engineer, and Dan, the Pilot.

Solution provided by Ekta27 has a slight error* (indicated below) but is the easier one (less number of steps) compared to the answer marked ‘Best’:

Splitting the process into individual steps:

The “Best Answer”:

1. Fill Cup A.
2. Keep aside. (For customer)
3. Fill Cup A again.
3. Keep aside (For customer)
4. Fill A again
5. Pour into B
6. Fill A again
7. Pour into B till B is full.
8. Pour remaining flour from A for customer.

Ekta’s answer (corrected):

1. Fill cup B.
2. Pour from cup B into cup A till A is full.
(* The sentence “Pack this for customer” after step 2 seems to imply that the qty filled in ‘A’ is to be packed, which is wrong.)
3. Keep aside (For customer)
4. Fill Cup B again.
5. Pack the contents of B for customer (along with the qty kept aside in step 3)

Answer- Maid

Explanation-
The maid: “I was dusting the corners of the house.”
but House is Circular so, where’s the Corners?

The ‘straight-forward’ answer seems to imply that the maid is an idiot who thought of finding ‘corners’ in a ’round house’.

But…

Nowhere in the puzzle it is said that, like the house, the individual rooms are round as well…! So, they CAN have corners, and the maid’s statement does make sense, which, in turn, makes the data given in the puzzle insufficient to solve it.

Answer– 94153

Explanation-
Let the number be VWXYZ

Conditions:

(1) V + X = 10
(2) V = Z^2 => V = 4 / 9 and Z = 2 / 3  (V = 1 => Z = 1 which is NOT allowed.) 
(3) Y = W + 1
(4) V + W + X + Y + Z = 22

Applying (1) and (3) in (4) => 10 + 2W + 1 + Z = 22

=> 2W + Z = 11   (5)

Exploring possible values from (2):

(a) If V = 4, Z = 2 then (5) =>  2W = 9 which is Impossible.
(b) If V = 9, Z = 3 then X = 1, W = 4, Y = 5.

Hence the code is 94153.

Jason said he was jogging and “decided to stop by and say hi” to his friend. If that indeed were the case, he should have gone straight to the door and rang the bell or knocked, and if – and only if – there was no response from inside, looked elsewhere. Instead, why did he “look through a window” first up?

Last bean left will be WHITE.

This is because the monkey always picks two beans at a time and either throws OR keeps both. So, with every pick-up, either two whites OR two backs will be removed (unless the pick is a black-white pair, which is as good as no pick, because they are put back). So, the only possibility of remaining till the end is only if the number is odd, which is white.

e.g. Assume that there are only 10 black and 9 white beans.

P1: Black + White => No result
P2: Black + Black => Remaining Blacks = 8
P3: White + White => Remaining Whites = 8

(Note: P2 & P3 may be in reverse order also, makes no difference)

Now, if P2 and P3 are repeated (in any order) four times, the entire set of blacks will be exhausted, whereas one white will remain. (Even if P3 was repeated 4 times in succession, one white will remain which will never be thrown out because it has is no pair to be thrown out with.

A number that’s a perfect square (e.g. 100) which is also a ‘Round figure‘. 🙂