Don't kids ask some stange things?

[Graye]

As we are in France at the moment and she is in the UK, my six year old grand daughter Hermione and I often "chat" via email. I suspect her parents say something like "ask Grandma, she'll know" when she asks things they can't come up with an answer for.

Last night's questions were :

"Do flies hatch out of different size eggs depending on what size they will be or do they "grow up" like people?" I suspect it's the former as they have a short life cycle with no time to "grow up" but does anyone know whether there are lots of different strains of fly please?

"If you had lots and lots of "front door keys" (I think she means Yale keys), how many would you have to try before you found another one which works?" I'm not sure on that either. Are key combinations infinite? I seem to remember that car keys are not.

Does anyone happen to know the answers to either of those questions please? I've told her I'll try to find out.

[Annpan]

I don't know the answers I am afraid Graye.

Last night I was asked 'Where is Elvis?".... she's only 2

[Mal]

Elvis is living with MJ in the Caribbean...

[Derry]

dont flies start as pupae and then a maggot and then a fly? bigger fly species probably have bigger eggs.. tell her start a fly farm, her parents will love it ;)

[Millymollymandy]

Elvis is living with MJ in the Caribbean...

Or possibly in the mortuary - sorry sick joke as MJ is dead and no-one has mentioned it!

[Derry]

Elvis is living with MJ in the Caribbean...

Or possibly in the mortuary - sorry sick joke as MJ is dead and no-one has mentioned it!

so many replies...

[MKG]

There are about ......................................................................... that many species of fly. They lay eggs, the eggs hatch into tiny maggots which gorge themselves to become fat, wriggly maggots and then pupate (skin turns hard and goes purply-red). At the appropriate time, fully-formed flies emerge from the pupae. The size of the flies depends completely upon the species.

Maggot fact - anglers often put maggots in their mouths to warm them up before putting them onto the hook. It's true!!!!!!!!! No good you anglers denying it.

Mike

[Graye]

What a horrible thought. Yuk...

Thanks for that anyway. My reputation as the fount of all knowledge might survive the evening - assuming I can sort out the key thing too!

[MKG]

It bothered me until I found out - Yale lock combinations!!!! The simplest locks have 5 individual spring-loaded stacks, each of which has four possible "keying" heights. So, there are 1024 possible keys (4x4x4x4x4). The complicated ones have six stacks, each with ten possible heights. So, 10x10x10x10x10x10 = 1 million possible keys.

At best, then, Hermione would have to carry over one thousand different keys in her pocket to be sure of getting past even the simplest lock. That's quite a weight - how big is she?

Mike

[Cloud]

When we first move in to a new house in a new housing estate we had been there only a few months when a man nocked on our door. He'd locked himself out of his house and wanted to borrow our key. It didn't work, but our neighbour's key did. He had visited less than ten houses. We changed our locks soon after that.

The key problem is Combinatorics, a branch of pure mathematics. Your granddaughter going to be a genius if she continues to think about this sort of problem.

[the.fee.fairy]

Elvis is living with MJ in the Caribbean...

Or possibly in the mortuary - sorry sick joke as MJ is dead and no-one has mentioned it!

so many replies...

Or...apparently, in a seven storey bunker underneath Graceland...