Mind Olympics

The Atlanta Olympics may be over, but the Mind Olympics continue until the end of this week. Today's programme includes events numerical, verbal and artistic. A set of correct answers to any single day's questions will qualify you for entry to the weekly draw from which one entrant will win pounds 100 worth of Waterstone's book vouchers. At the end of the three- week event, all correct entries will have another chace to win the grand prize of a 21-volume Macmillan Family Encyclopaedia (worth pounds 525).

When you have solved all five puzzles, send the answers to: Mind Olympics (Day 12), the Independent, 1 Canada Square, Canary Wharf, London E14 5DL to arrive not later than 13 August 1996.

Books for independent individuals at

Waterstone's

1. Here is a list of five 5-letter words. They all start with the same two letters in the same order; they all end with the same two letters in the same order. If you leave out the middle letter of any of these words, what word results?

- - L - -

- - M - -

- - N - -

- - P - -

- - S - -

2. How many odd numbers between 0 and 1,000,000 are divisible without remainder by 3?

4. A heterodigital number, as we may have mentioned in an earlier question, is one all of whose digits are different. 1639 and 7509134 are heterodigital, as is 3.

The number 289765480 is not, and neither is 77. The smallest heterodigital number is clearly 0, and the largest is 9876543210.

Including these, how many different heterodigital numbers are there in all?

4. What property do these letters have in common that they do not share with the remaining letters of the alphabet:

a e f h i l m n o r s x?

5. The justly neglected artist Garabaggio has it all figured out. The function of modern art is to challenge the way people think. And what better way can there possibly be of challenging the way people think than to paint something that cannot be understood because there is nothing in it to understand?

His latest picture, entitled "Rococo Cola" is shown here. How many squares can be found all in all in its design?

Questions set by

Maslanka