New Year Rocket Firing
Sunday, May 20th, 2018Two mathematicians, Albert and Lenny, were busy firing off rockets to celebrate New Year’s Eve.
“Hey Albert, how many rockets do you have left?” asked Lennie, who loved to see and hear the rockets burst into colorful explosions in the night sky.
“Well, Lennie, I have exactly half as many rockets as I have matches in my matchbox,” replied Albert cryptically.
“Interesting. So how many matches do you have in your matchbox?” asked Lennie.
“If I hadn’t used 20 of the matches, I would have had exactly half a box full,” said Albert cheerfully.
“And I wonder how many matches there were in the matchbox when it was full?” asked Lennie.
“Exactly six times as many as the number of rockets I now have,” answered Albert.
“Great!! Now we can keep firing rockets for a while,” replied Lennie happily.
Can you work out how many rockets Albert had?