these are some problems from a Russian puzzle book. I've adapted and changed them a little bit...
1) Bob is going on a journey. For the first half he takes a horse cart, which goes 3 times faster than he can walk. For the second half he took an oxen cart, which goes half as fast as he can walk. Would he have gone faster or slower if he had walked all the way on foot? And how much time is saved for the faster way?
2) Randy's pals ask him how many kittens he has. His answer was: "Three-quarters of their number plus three-quarters of a kitten." His pals laughed at the joke, but it wasn't a joke... and he doesn't have any chopped up kittens either. How many kittens does he have?
3) There are 12 flags at an ancient Olympic race. The runners start at the first flag of course. A certain runner has the same speed and stride all the way throughout the race. When he got to flag 8, four seconds had gone by. How many seconds did it take for him to finish the race?
4) Two bikers are 180 miles apart and going toward each other on a straight line. They are biking steadily at 15 mph. A fly (going 30 mph) is flying constantly in between them. When it reaches the next biker, it turns around and goes back to meet the next biker, etc. When the bikers meet and the fly stops flying, how many miles has the fly flown?
5) A bus leaves Manhattan to go to Queens at noon. A biker leaves Queens to go to Manhattan an hour later, and the biker is going 15 mph slower than the bus. When they meet, which is farther from Manhattan?
6) The toy costs $1 plus half its price. How much does it cost?
I hope these haven't already been posted...