# Fiendish riddle: Can you answer it? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [June 5, 2025, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232 "2025-06-05T14:56:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2025, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/21 "2025-06-05T22:28:18Z")
He’s a character in a **[Portuguese TV series](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1986_(Portuguese_TV_series))**. ---
**Author:** ![phs3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8491ac/32.png) [@phs3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phs3)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2025, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/22 "2025-06-06T02:19:14Z")
I must be missing something. It doesn’t say “50 years to the day”. If you’re born June 1 1980 and die June 2 1981, folks would say you died “a year later”. Same if you died July 1. There’s a cutoff somewhere – probably varying per person and situation – but if the dude was born in late December 1955 and died January 1, 1986, “50 years later” would work for me. ---
**Author:** ![phs3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8491ac/32.png) [@phs3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phs3)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2025, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/23 "2025-06-06T02:19:58Z")
O jeez. Reading on phone. Nevermind! Mods feel free to delete. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2025, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/24 "2025-06-06T02:28:24Z")
> [@jnglmassiv](#): > > Plausible, who among us doesn’t enjoy playing poker in a hotel room? On the 19th floor? At age 14? **To the death?** - “No, to the pain.” ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2025, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/25 "2025-06-06T03:45:03Z")
Two guys are talking at a party, and one of them mentions that he’s in the Navy. The other guy says “that must be tough, having to be away from your family for so long while you’re at sea.” The Navy guy says “I haven’t had sex with my wife since 2005.” The other guy says “wow, how on earth do you stand it?” The Navy guy says “it’s not so bad.” Then he looks at his watch “hell, it’s only 2130, now.” ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2025, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/26 "2025-06-06T03:53:58Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > someone who does know the solution (or purports to) but only ever just says “no, that’s wrong” to everything anyone comes up with, no matter how plausible it is. This right here sours me on “laterial thinking” puzzles. It’s always “nope, that’s wrong” and never even a “hmmmm, you know, that would work, but not the answer I was thinking of personally”. So the aim is to have the _exact same_ “lateral thinking” as the teller! ---
**Author:** ![Jackknifed\_Juggernaut](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9de053/32.png) [@Jackknifed\_Juggernaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackknifed_Juggernaut)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2025, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/27 "2025-06-06T03:59:26Z")
I think that’s true for some lateral thinking puzzles, but the good ones do have a pretty unique and plausible solution. ---
**Author:** ![Spoons](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spoons/32/3141_2.png) [@Spoons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoons)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2025, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/28 "2025-06-06T04:14:05Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > Two guys are talking at a party, and one of them mentions that he’s in the Navy. The other guy says “that must be tough, having to be away from your family for so long while you’re at sea.” > > The Navy guy says “I haven’t had sex with my wife since 2005.” > > The other guy says “wow, how on earth do you stand it?” > > The Navy guy says “it’s not so bad.” Then he looks at his watch “hell, it’s only 2130, now.” That’s rather like we say at the horse racing track: “I bet on a horse at ten to one. Damn nag didn’t cross the finish line until three-thirty.” ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2025, 6:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/29 "2025-06-06T06:09:16Z")
Another possibility is that it actually said that he was born in 1985. It means that he was born in room 1985 of the hospital. There’s no way to tell unless we can get hold of all of the Marilyn vos Savant’s columns. Does anyone here have access to those columns? ---
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2025, 9:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/30 "2025-06-06T09:08:27Z")
TOUR GUIDE: And on this spot, the Magna Carta was signed! TOURIST: When was that? TOUR GUIDE: 1215. TOURIST: Damn, we missed it by twenty minutes! ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2025, 1:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/31 "2025-06-06T13:29:20Z")
'Zactly. The difference between a good or bad puzzle comes down to a) how difficult it is, and b) how unique the answer is. Lotta writers can master a). Most suck at b). And for sure the 27th generation plagiarization that so often happens pretty well guarantees the [whatever puzzle] we’re looking at today has been garbled along the way. ---
**Author:** ![Kzbre5m](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f08c70/32.png) [@Kzbre5m](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kzbre5m)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2025, 1:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/32 "2025-06-06T13:44:31Z")
Sounds like the date method they use here on the SDMB, for posts dated later this month but not displaying it as last year. > They are playing poker in hotel room 1986. > Note the riddle does not say “the year” 1986. I’d go with this. ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2025, 2:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/33 "2025-06-06T14:00:44Z")
“Playing poker” is too specific not to be a clue or at least a red herring. Otherwise, why not just say “he was born in the year 1985 and died fifty years later in 1986”? ---
**Author:** ![Stanislaus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stanislaus/32/3391_2.png) [@Stanislaus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stanislaus)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2025, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/34 "2025-06-06T15:02:33Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > These f-ed up puzzles / riddles / math problems alway remind me of this little gem: This would work better if he’d got the riddle right though. The way the teller says it “There are three words in the English language _that end in ‘gry’_” makes the “I said three words in the English language” claim obvious horseshit. The correct telling is “‘Hungry’ and ‘angry’ are two words that end in ‘gry’. There are three words in the English language. What’s the third?” This makes the “I said there are three words in the English language” reveal at least true, albeit still annoying. (Which isn’t to say whoever told Monroe the riddle didn’t fuck it up.) (That said, the skill of paying close attention to instructions, parsing them carefully and delivering to the letter is one that in other guises society values highly, such guises being e.g. coders, lawyers, tabletop gamers\*.) ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2025, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/35 "2025-06-06T18:39:23Z")
I always thought the answer is “Gryphon, I didn’t say _which_ end.” ---
**Author:** ![Jaycat.again](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jaycat.again/32/11525_2.png) [@Jaycat.again](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jaycat.again)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2025, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/36 "2025-06-06T21:26:52Z")
I bet I can tell you where you got those shoes. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2025, 10:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/37 "2025-06-06T22:57:08Z")
Ahem … got dem shoes. ---
**Author:** ![Pheoinix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7993a0/32.png) [@Pheoinix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pheoinix)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2025, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/38 "2025-06-06T23:19:45Z")
By “Born in 1985”, it could mean he was born some time before 1985, as in the sense of saying… unlike his younger brother, he was born the last time the Bears won the Superbowl ---
**Author:** ![xtenkfarpl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/c2a13f/32.png) [@xtenkfarpl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xtenkfarpl)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2025, 11:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/39 "2025-06-07T11:55:09Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Ahem … got dem shoes. Unless the logic is pretzel… ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2025, 12:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232/40 "2025-06-07T12:16:45Z")
Or the sneakers are bad [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fiendish-riddle-can-you-answer-it/1019232.md?page=1)