Archive for May 6th, 2008

Conundrum: Family Dinner

Tuesday, May 6th, 2008

1. Eight members of a nine-member family decided to meet for dinner one evening. Each of them arrived separately. The restaurant took down the last name of the first person to arrive and agreed to set up a table.

2. Hildy’s sister-in-law was the only member of the family who couldn’t make it to dinner.

3. Josie’s daughter has a first and last name which begin with the same letter.

4. Lisa’s father, who was the only male to arrive between the two brothers, has a first name that ends with the fifth and third letters of his last name, in that order.

5. Otis is the only person related by blood to everyone who came to dinner. One of his two uncles has a last name that ends with the third letter of Otis’s other uncle’s last name.

6. Paul arrived immediately after his grandson, whose last name begins with four letters in alphabetical order, none of which are identical or even alphabetically consecutive.

7. Rose arrived immediately after her father, whose first and last names share a common second letter, though at least one of the letters of his first name doesn’t appear in any last name in the family.

8. Sean’s brother-in-law’s name is unusual in that his first name consists of letters that span the exact same range of letters in the alphabet as the letters in his last name, even though his last name is twice as long as his first name (for example, the name “Sean” spans the letters “A through S”).

9. Tom arrived immediately after his sister-in-law, who has never married. Her first and last names share a common fourth letter.

10. Tim’s sister-in-law has a maiden name that could be a cryptogram for her last name.

11. No two people who arrived consecutively to dinner share any common letters in their first names.

12. This is a very traditional family: nobody is divorced, and nobody has been married more than once. All couples are heterosexual, all names are gender-appropriate, all married women have taken their husbands’ last names, all children were born in wedlock, and nobody has married any kind of relative. The clues above do not refer to anybody other than the nine family members, either by name or relation. Nobody has a Q anywhere in his or her name, but at least one of the family members has a last name that contains a U.

The table for eight is almost ready, and the entire party has arrived.

For what name should they be listening?

UPDATE: Puzzle solved by Neel Mehta. Solution provided by ArtVark. See comments for answer.