Mental Mento Math by Colleen

Please welcome our first guest writer!!

Note: Try to do all of these problems mentally. Writing down the answers to keep them straight in your head is alright, but do the problems in your head.

You are on a long road trip. The boredom is starting to get to you. To pass the time, you take stock of what food you have. You have 5 carrots, 10 apples and a package with 15 rolls of Mentos.

Being a dedicated math student, you decide to figure out how many Mentos you can have. Here are the facts you know:

• Each roll of Mentos has 14 Mentos in it
• You are sharing the Mentos with 2 other people
• You have 20 hours of driving
• You will have two meals in those 20 hours, each 45 minutes long (you will not be eating Mentos during this time, nor will you need a Mento for 15 minutes after the meal)
• 5 Mentos have already been eaten

You want to make the Mentos last until you reach your destination. Now figure out:

• How many Mentos do you get total?
• How many Mentos can you have per hour?
• How long would you need to make a Mento last so you don't go 5 minutes without having a Mento in your mouth?

Extra Brain Stretchers

2 hours into your trip, you eat one of the apples. Now you are full for half an hour. To still finish all of the Mentos by the time you reach your destination, how many should each person get?

4 hours into the drive, you are stopped by road construction. You stay there for an hour and a half, and eat the same amount of Mentos that you would in 2 hours, as does everybody else. Now how many Mentos per hour does each person get?

15 hours into the drive, you fall asleep for 25 minutes. During that time, your sister sneaks a Mento per every 5 minutes you are asleep. Now how many Mentos does everyone get per hour?

Half an hour from your destination, you stop at a gas station and your sister buys a Snickers bar. She says that you and your father (who is driving) can split the remander of her Mentos. To finish all of the Mentos in time, how many Mentos do you and your father have to each eat?