CD That Only Skips in the Kitchen

Puzzler time.

This one comes from the home appliance slash algebraic series.

A few weeks ago, I was convinced—against my better judgment—that I needed a new CD player.

The old one was perfectly fine… but apparently not “good enough.”

So we buy a new one. It works beautifully.

Which leaves me with the old CD player.

Instead of selling it, I move it into the kitchen and hook it up to my Bose Wave Radio.

Everything’s connected, I pop in one of my favorite CDs…

…and it skips.

Badly.

So I figure the CD is bad.

I try another CD—it plays perfectly.

I take the “bad” CD and try it in the new player—it works perfectly.

I go back to the kitchen player, try again… skipping all over the place.

So now I know:

The CD is fine

The CD player is fine

Everything is hooked up correctly

But something changed when I moved the player from the living room to the kitchen…

Just not in the way you’d expect.

So the puzzler question is:

Why does that one CD skip in the kitchen—but play perfectly everywhere else?

Good luck.

Answer the Puzzler »

Remember last week's puzzler?

The Rookie Bet That Didn’t Add Up

At the start of a baseball season, two rookie players make a bet.

They bet $20 on who will have the better batting average by the end of the season.

We’ll call them Bluto and Popeye.

Now it’s the last day of the season.

Neither one is playing, and they’re standing around watching batting practice.

Bluto says, “Hey Popeye, what did you hit before the All-Star break?”

Popeye says, “.250.”

Bluto says, “Ha! I hit .300.”

Then Bluto asks, “What about after the All-Star break?”

Popeye says, “.375.”

Bluto says, “That’s good—but I hit .400. You owe me 20 bucks.”

But just then, the bat boy wanders over and says,

“Don’t pay him. I think you won.”

Now here’s an important fact:

They both had the **same total number of at-bats for the entire season**.

So the puzzler question is:

How could Popeye have the higher overall batting average—even though Bluto had the higher average in both halves of the season?