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        riddles >> hard >> I need help with this riddle
        
(Message started by: laffytaffycandy on Sep 8^th, 2004, 2:51pm)

Title: I need help with this riddle
Post by laffytaffycandy on Sep 8^th, 2004, 2:51pm

Hello,

My name is Candiace, and I really need help with this puzzle. My math teacher is stupid and makes us solve riddles each week for a grade. I find it ridiculous. If anyone can help me out, I would greatly appreciate it.

Here goes for my first riddle of the semester:

What weighs two pounds when it covers four miles?

Thankyou,
Candiace

Title: Re: I need help with this riddle
Post by Grimbal on Sep 8^th, 2004, 4:18pm

Well, that is 907 grams for 6427 m or 0.14 g per meter.
Could be hair.

Title: Re: I need help with this riddle
Post by rmsgrey on Sep 9^th, 2004, 4:17am

Sounds more like something that belongs in "What am I"

Title: Re: I need help with this riddle
Post by asterix on Sep 9^th, 2004, 5:50am

Well, I think a league, the distance you can walk in an hour, is about 3 or 4 miles. Now if the weight was a pound and a half, I'd say the answer was a basketball league. Close enough?

Title: Re: I need help with this riddle
Post by rmsgrey on Sep 9^th, 2004, 12:30pm

A league usually seems to be equated to 3 miles...

Title: Re: I need help with this riddle
Post by John_Gaughan on Sep 10^th, 2004, 1:14pm

on 09/09/04 at 12:30:56, rmsgrey wrote:

A league usually seems to be equated to 3 miles...

According to Google:
one league = 3.45233834 miles
http://www.google.com/search?q=one+league+in+miles&btnG=Google+Search
Of course, the Google calculator is not infallible.

Title: Re: I need help with this riddle
Post by asterix on Sep 10^th, 2004, 2:20pm

That's why I asked "Close enough?" The league was stretching it, and a basketball is really nowhere close to 2 pounds (20-22 ounces). But it seemed like the clever sort of an answer the riddle might be looking for, and nobody's come up with anything better.

Title: Re: I need help with this riddle
Post by rmsgrey on Sep 11^th, 2004, 6:10am

According to this site (http://www.unc.edu/~rowlett/units/index.html), the league is:
Quote:

a traditional unit of distance. Derived from an ancient Celtic unit and adopted by the Romans as the leuga, the league became a common unit of measurement throughout western Europe. It was intended to represent, roughly, the distance a person could walk in an hour. The Celtic unit seems to have been rather short (about 1.5 Roman miles, which is roughly 1.4 statute miles or 2275 meters), but the unit grew longer over time. In many cases it was equal to 3 miles, using whatever version of the mile was current. At sea, the league was most often equal to 3 nautical miles, which is 1/20 degree [2], 3.45 statute miles, or exactly 5556 meters. In the U.S. and Britain, standard practice is to define the league to be 3 statute miles (about 4828.03 meters) on land or 3 nautical miles at sea. However, many occurrences of the "league" in English-language works are actually references to the Spanish league (the legua), the Portuguese league (legoa) or the French league (lieue).

Title: Re: I need help with this riddle
Post by Nigel_Parsons on Sep 25^th, 2004, 9:15am

Taking tips from the answers above I started checking ball weights for various sports.
The best answer seams to be a 'bowls league'
The bowls used for 'crown green bowls' have weights ranging between 2 - 3.5 pounds