From The Mind of Merc - Rhyming Riddles

(Now my internet has finally been restored almost a month after moving (and the day after my 'go-live' date - hence the delay in this post))

Sometimes I find my mind wandering over various eclectic topics and occasionally I am inspired to write some of them down. Today I was thinking about rhyming riddles. And more importantly their solutions.

For example:

How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck would chuck wood

About as much wood as a woodchuck chucks if a woodchuck could chuck wood

But given that woodchucks (or groundhogs) are not as adept as beavers as chucking wood this would not be as considerable as you might think.

According to Cornell, it is believed to be around 700 pounds.

If all the world were paper and all the seas were ink

If all the trees were bread and cheese, what would we have to drink?

Not ink obviously. Well, alright we would have it but who would want it?

The cheese, however, may prove more useful – whey may not be particularly appetising but it’s got to be better than ink!

Around the ragged rocks the ragged rascal ran

How many r’s are there in that? Now tell me if you can

The answer to this is apparently none (of which I’ve never been convinced) but I suppose it’s true if you take it to mean how many times does the sound ‘arr’ occur in the rhyme

As I was going to St. Ives,

I met a man with seven wives,

Each wife had seven sacks,

Each sack had seven cats,

Each cat had seven kits:

Kits, cats, sacks, and wives,

How many were there going to St. Ives?

One. Me.

If you’re confused, the poem begins ‘As I going to St Ives’. It never says where the other 2752 mentioned are going.

(And if you're now puzzling over my maths I didn’t include the sacks as beings that were going to St Ives – just the man (1), his wives (7), the cats in each sack (7x49=343) and the kits of each cat (7x343=2401))

Why is a raven like a writing desk?

Apparently this infamous riddle (which, ok, isn’t technically a rhyme) doesn’t have an answer but I think it does – it’s because they’re both black! Solved!* Next!

The man in the wilderness asked me,
How many strawberries grew in the sea?
I answered him as I thought good,
As many as red herrings grew in the wood.

An interesting little rhyme which supposedly suggests one is as daft as the other. 

BUT there are actually strawberries under the sea! If you don’t believe me, take a look. And, if you’re being extremely obtuse, you could say some red herrings grow in the wood – for example, if a crime thriller author decides to pen their latest work whilst taking a wander through a copse – voila! Red herrings would grow in the wood!

What is the creature that walks on four legs in the morning,

two legs at noon and three in the evening?"

The riddle of the deadly sphinx.

The answer to which this is man (crawls as a baby, walks as an adult and uses a stick as a pensioner) but I think the answer could just as easily be a chair - starts of with 4 legs, loses 2 during its service life gets 1 replaced.

Out of the eater came forth meat and out of the strong came something sweet.

A biblical one this one - the answer to which is apparently 'The honey produced by bees nestled in the carcass of the lion he defeated.' 

However, could it not also be the food provided by birds for their chicks? Out of the bird that ate the worm comes the regurgitated meal and out of the strong parent comes the sweet sustenance their babies crave to survive.

There are, of course, also the numerous riddles posed by Bilbo Baggins and Gollum in J.R.R. Tolkien's 'The Hobbit' but maybe they're for another time.

* Aldous Huxley, however, believed the answer was ‘Poe wrote on both’