Blog Post #114: For My Friend M.E. and for Mandy πŸ˜Š

Dear Readers,

What name can you think of involving just M and Y? This was a fun, quick, wee warm-up puzzle because M AND Y makes MANDY, in honour of a lovely friend of mine 😊.

Now get ready to solve for X !

Lots of Math problems say ‘Find X.’ Here, you can’t miss it!! 😊

Punny thoughts for a sunny day: Learn your trig. facts ‘n formulas at the beach!!
It’s all for a good cos., you’ll get a free tan…
and soon the teacher smiling at your work will be a bright sine! 😊
P.S. Congratulations for figuring out that the island is approximately 17.1 metres from the beach.

Earlier today, I wrote to another friend to thank him for having shared, via Facebook, a beautiful Maths problem involving Trigonometry. His initials are M.E., and his wonderful puzzles are greatly appreciated by me! 😊

The beautiful trigonometric equation that my friend M.E. shared via Facebook today 😊
I found that the general solution is x = Pi/4 + n*Pi/2
where n is any integer and x is in radian measure (instead of degrees).

During the process of solving the equation, I made repeated use of the most famous Pythagorean Trigonometric Identity marked with a double star in the photo below.

Math J😊kes + M😊re: Did you know that about 3.14% of sailors are Pi-rates!?

Why do you never take a p from a pirate?…He’d be irate!
For lunch today, I ate a pizza of radius z and thickness a. Its volume was Pi*z*z*a !!
Here in Blog Post #114, count an extra 200 calories per yummy slice that you sneak…
because 114+200=314 or approx. Pi*1😊😊

A ZIGZAG W😊RD PUZZLE

Use all the letters of A ZIGZAG to make the 7-letter name of the city in Egypt where my friend M.E. lives.

Zagazig in Egypt

I think that M.E. is interested in Chess, and so here comes a b😊nus puzzle in which it’s White to move and force checkmate in not more than 4 moves.

White to play and force checkmate in not more than 4 moves

Today is November 12, and in another 12 days’ time it will be my nephew’s birthday. On that day, it will also be exactly 10 years and 114 days since the above chess game was played; a fitting conclusion to Blog Post #114.

Congratulations for finding 1 Kg1!, after which Black has nothing better than 1…Qd6 allowing 2 Rxf8+ Qxf8 3 Rh2+ Qh6 4 Rxh6#, checkmate!

I would like to wish everyone a very happy weekend now.

With kindest wishes as always,

Paul M😊twani xxx

Author: Paul A. Motwani

My name is Paul Motwani, but my colleagues, my students and their parents mostly call me "Mr. Mo"! My middle initial, A, stands for Anthony, because I was born on the official feast day of St. Anthony of Padua, the patron saint of miracles and of lost souls. I love teaching Mathematics and Chess, and giving fun-packed talks and shows in schools and clubs. The popular ingredients of Math, Chess, Mystery and Magic are my "Fantastic Four", and I give prizes too! I am an International Chess Grandmaster, and (loooooong ago!) I was the World Under-17 Champion. I am the author of five published chess books and hundreds of newspaper articles. I live with my wonderful wife and son in Belgium. I also love music, movies and puzzles. I blog at paulmotwani.com. My e-mail address is pmotwani141@gmail.com. You can find me on Facebook, too.

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