Puzzle for the day

[Rakhal]

The names of three trees are hidden in the sentences below. Can you find them? (Hint: The letters are in consecutive order.)

In the office, dark lighting is not good. The dark walls soak up light. A novel manner of solving this would be better artificial light.

[Carthrat]

Cedar, Oak, something. >_>;;

[Getzeye]

Cedar, Oak, Elm.  ^^;

[Carthrat]

Bah! Can't believe I missed it. @_@

[Getzeye]

The first one was screwing me up. Took me a while longer then the other two.

[Rakhal]

A closely fought cookie, but Getz wins it :)

Halbarad: 4
Getzeye: 4
Kwok: 2
Carthrat: 1
Dune: 1
Edward: 1
KLSymph: 1

[Carthrat]

Guest puzzlemaker Carthrat strikes!

Assume you have two pieces of string, of equal length, and an infinite number of matches. Both pieces of string, you have been told, will burn for exactly an hour. However, they will not burn at a constant rate; at some points, they will burn quickly, and at other points, they will burn slowly. They also do not burn at the same rate as each other.

You must discern a method to measure fifteen minutes using the pieces of string and the matches.

[Rakhal]

Tie a bunch of matches to the end of one string and suspend it to form a pendulum. Start it swinging. Light the other string. Count the oscillations of the pendulum until the string burns out. This gives you the number of oscillations in an hour. Divide by 4 to get the number in 15 minutes.

--Rakhal

[Getzeye]

Won't the pendulum slow down?

[Rakhal]

A property of pendulums is that the oscillation period is determined by the length of the string (and I think gravity). The size of the oscillation is not a factor. So no, it won't slow down, though you may need to boost the swings every now and then.

Otherwise pendulum clocks wouldn't work very well

--Rakhal

[Getzeye]

Ahh..ok...>.>;;

[Carthrat]

Cookie for Rak. That's not the way I expected to see, but it's superior to the alternate method by far. ^^

[Rakhal]

And another bonus puzzle. Fairly old, but fun

 In one ancient Elgrothian town the laws of marriage were very strict. A
man was only allowed one wife, but that wife must be faithful to him. If
you discovered that your wife was unfaithful, you had to take her out to
the town square at dawn and chop off her head! However the men in that town
loved their wives and wouldn't do that unless they had definite proof.
 The women were of two sorts. They either lived by the law, or if they
broke it they broke it good! They had sex with EVERY other man in the town.
Naturally though no man would tell an unfaithful wifes husband of her
infidelity, although they do know that women who are unfaithful are unfaithful
with everyone.
 One day the King came to stay the night. The next morning a notice was
posted in town square saying 'There is infidelity in this town!'
 The men brooded, talked to no-one, drank, and thought. 40 days later, forty
men dragged their wives out to the town square at dawn and chopped their heads
off. How did they know?

--Rakhal

(updated to add a little more info and formatting)

[Halbarad]

The only guess I have is that the men whose wives were gone while they fooled around with everyone ELSE'S wives realized just what their own wives must have been up to at the same time. Doesn't really seem to fit quite right, but it's the best guess I can make.

[Rakhal]

Nope. Circumstantial evidence, they could have been out playing cards and they wont execute their wives unless they know :)

--Rakhal