Monday 6 December 2010

Philosophical Puzzles ~ 'Have One On Me!'

POSTED IN:  ~ PhilosophyPuzzles            

"Have One On Me!"

Three intrepid explorers have decided to cross the desert alone. There's Barmy Brian, the world-renowned desert scientist. There's his long suffering wife, Weary Wendy, and their personal assistant, Pretty Petulia.

The expedition gets under way, and Barmy Brian barges on as usual, oblivious to everything except his desert plants, oh, and Pretty Petulia's legs, which he focuses on particularly closely as they make their way across the sand dunes.

Brian is quite happy to have Petulia as his 'bit on the side' and doesn't even think his wife, Wendy, as noticed. But she has.

He also thinks that Petulia is perfectly satisfied to be hobnobbing (and occasionally bed-bugging) with a famous biologist who takes her on trips around the world. Only this time it's different.

Petulia is annoyed that Brian won't leave his wife for her, and has decided to use this trip, away from the watching world, to poison him.

So during the night, as Brian and Wendy lie sleeping, Petulia sneaks over to Brian's water bottle and slips in some poison which she brought along for that very purpose. If she can't have Brian, then no-one's gonna have him!

The dastardly deed done, Petulia goes back to her sleeping bag and falls asleep. A few minutes later Brian's wife wakes up, sees the others sleeping, and decides this is the moment she's been waiting for. She'll finally be rid of this pompous, cheeting swine of a husband!

She, in turn, creeps over to Brian's waterbottle and punctures it, leaving its contents to leak out and be instantly absorbed by the sand. Neither woman has any idea of the actions of the other.

The following morning, everyone wakes us as usual, and the day begins normally. The ladies go off to do their lady things, taking their water bottles with them, nervously remembering the night before and wondering how things will turn out. They get to talking and find they have quite a lot in common, including their dislike of men who want to have their cake and eat it. They decide to go for a long walk, chatting more and more deeply, although all the while carefully avoiding the subject of their shared misdeeds, Brian. Indeed, if you looked at them, you'd think they'd be quite happy to go on talking forever...

When they finally finish talking and walking the whole day has passed and they suddenly 'remembered' Brian and head back to the camp. They find Brian dead on the sand, his empty, poisoned but leaky water bottle lying pathetically by his side.

The question is: who, if anyone, killed Brian? Surely not Petulia, because he didn't drink so much as a drop of poisoned water - it was all gone! But then didn't Wendy equally save him from a horrible death by getting rid of the poisoned water?

If you think you know, or even if you don't, leave a comment here. I'm not saying there's a straightforward answer, but then again I'm not saying there's not! Over to you :-D

See you in the gene pool
FrabulousFrog

1 comment:

James said...

You could argue it was Wendy cause he died of thirst but it was the combination of the two actions by Petulia and Wendy that sealed his fate, by getting rid of the posioned water Wendy was simply facilitating another way for him to die

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