[from Chalapathi, via UGA Humor List]

Lateral Puzzles

This kind of puzzle teaches you to check your assumptions about any
situation. You need to be open-minded, flexible and creative in your
questioning and able to put lots of different clues and pieces of
information together. Once you reach a viable solution you keep going
in order to refine it or replace it with a better solution. This is
lateral thinking!

#1  Friday

     A man rode into town on Friday. He stayed for three nights and
     then left on Friday. How come?

#2 The Deadly Party

     A man went to a party and drank some of the punch. He then left
     early. Everyone else at the party who drank the punch
     subsequently died of poisoning. Why did the man not die?

#3 The Blind Beggar

     A blind beggar had a brother who died. What relation was the
     blind beggar to the brother who died? (Brother is not the
     answer).

#4 The Elder Twin

     One day Kerry celebrated her birthday. Two days later her older
     twin brother, Terry, celebrated his birthday. How come?

Solutions

1.  The man's horse was called Friday.

2.  The poison in the punch came from the ice cubes. When the man
drank the punch the ice was fully frozen. Gradually it melted,
poisoning the punch.
2b The man himself poisoned the punch
2c Someone else poisoned it later

3.  The blind beggar was the sister of her brother who died.

4.  At the time she went into labor, the mother of the twins was
travelling by boat. The older twin, Terry, was born first early on
March 1st. The boat then crossed the International Date line (or any
time zone line)  and Kerry, the younger twin, was born on February the
28th. In a leap year the younger twin celebrates her birthday two days
before her older brother.