Has there ever been a case where one word is worth a thousand pictures?
Louvre.
Jennifer Horat, Lengwil, Switzerland
• Money.
Jennifer Rathbone, Toronto, Canada
• Delete.
Margaret Wyeth, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada
• Yes. Theatre.
Dick Hedges, Nairobi, Kenya
• Cinema.
Jim Dewar, Gosford, NSW, Australia
• Kaleidoscope.
Cathal Brady, Sydney, Australia
• The word love has spawned thousands of images as artists try to capture its multifarious nature.
Stuart Williams, Kampala, Uganda
• Yes, when it is the answer to the question, “Will you marry me?”
Nigel Bolland, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, US
Raven and the writing desk
What’s your favourite riddle?
Variations on how the camel got its hump.
Philip Stigger, Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada
• Which vegetable always burns when fried? Chard.
David Tucker, Halle, Germany
• What sits at the bottom of the sea and shivers? A nervous wreck! (This was the first riddle I can remember my father telling me.)
Pat Phillips, Adelaide, Australia
• What’s the difference between a stoat and a weasel? One is weasely identifiable; the other is stoatally different.
Douglas Nichols, Hobart, Tasmania, Australia
• The Mad Hatter’s Why is a raven like a writing desk? because it still awaits the perfect solution. Many have ventured answers, including Lewis Carroll, but none is fully satisfactory.
Gillian Shenfield, Sydney, Australia
Getting a black cab in London
Where or when is the nick of time?
“The nick of time” exists only in James Bond and other movies of that ilk. This trick harks back to Harold Lloyd silent comedies with their white-knuckle close-scrape scenes, such as the cliche of the distressed damsel tied to the tracks as the locomotive speeds nearer.
Real life just ain’t like that.
R M Fransson, Wheat Ridge, Colorado, US
• In London, in a pouring rain, when I arrive at the last propitious moment to catch a black cab.
Sylvie Morrissette, Los Angeles, California, US
• Just before the crack of doom.
John Caryl, Orillia, Ontario, Canada
• You just missed it!
Alan Williams-Key, Madrid, Spain
• A notch above being late.
Richard Orlando, Westmount, Quebec, Canada
When my team is out of it
What sport most taxes an observer’s ability to stay interested?
The one where my favourite team or player is out of the running for the championship.
Doreen Forney, Pownal, Vermont, US
Caesar was extremely upset
The most famous last words?
In Australia those of the bushranger Ned Kelly, who said “Such is life” just before he was hanged.
David Isaacs, Sydney, Australia
• “Et tu, Brute?”
Fred Fairhead, Erindale, South Australia
• On his deathbed Voltaire was urged to renounce the devil. He replied: “This is not the time to make enemies.”
John LeBrun, Prades sur Vernazobre, France
Any answers?
Which official cover-ups have never been found out?
E Slack, L’Isle Jourdain, France
Would the world be a better place had the atom not been split?
Andrew Sheeran, Lennoxville, Quebec, Canada
Send answers to weekly.nandq@theguardian.com or Guardian Weekly, Kings Place, 90 York Way, London N1 9GU, UK
