How many animals in 12 days of Christmas?

[Kodiak Kid]

time for the annual X-Mas math!

1) How many Animals would you have (not counting humans) if you received all the animals in the song "The 12 Days of Christmas"?

Show your work for full credit.

2) How many humans?
3) How many musical instruments?
4) How many plants?

Pret? Allez!!

[Angwyn Lothar]

well let see

18 anmials

56 humans

23 musical insturments

and one oh so famous plant.

[Almightynoitall]

23 animals (arguably 31 though)
1 Partridge
2 Turtle Doves
3 French Hens
4 Calling Birds
6 Geese-a-laying
7 Swans a swimming

and 8 cows/goats... 1 per maid for milking...


humans:
12 drummers drumming
11 pipers piping
10 lords a-leaping
9 ladies dancing
8 maids-a-milking

for a nice round 50 humans...



Musical Instruments:
4 calling birds (voices, which technically count as instruments)
11 pipers piping (whether it's a single pipe they're tooting has yet to be determined)
12 Drummers Drumming (one drum apiece? or one massive drum they're all banging on to drive everyone insane???)

thus 27 instruments


Plants:

1... a pear tree, unless you meant the kind of government spy type, in which three of the lords-a-leaping are currently under investigation... the government disavows any knowledge of such...



actually, each number and item have a meaning, as described here: http://www.cresourcei.org/cy12days.html

[Kodiak Kid]

Wrong wrong wrong. each day you get another partridge etc. Keep trying!

We'll make some assumptions re:
Maids a milking - they each come with one (1) animal (cow/goat/ferret...whatever).
The plants are NOT spies! but something you might have in your yard or arboretum etc.
I'll not accept animals as musical instruments, sorry.

[Zelda]

Lets see

12 x 1 partridge
11 x 2 turtle doves
10 x 3 French Hens
9 x 4 calling birds
7 x 6 Geese
6 x 7 Swans
5 x 8 milking animals

Gives
224 animals

5 x 8 maids a milking
4 x 9 ladies dancing
3 x 10 lords a leaping
2 x 11 pipers piping
1 x 12 drummers drumming

Give
140 humans

2 x 11 pipes
1 x 12 drumes

Gives
36 instruments

12 x 1 pear tree

Gives 12 plants

And there are 40 gold rings up for grabs!

[Kodiak Kid]

Very good Zelda! Your logic is impeccable. Too bad your math is WRONG!

I'll give you a chance to figure out your error before final grading...

[KShan5[PrFC]]

wouldn't that give you 34 instruments? 22+12=34?

[Kodiak Kid]

Very good gang. Now, using the resources available to you from the song, What would you be able to make for Christmas dinner?

Be adventurous!!

[Almightynoitall]

very well... I assumed there was no repetition, but a continued pushing of the same ones... therefore,
1 Partridge X 12 days = 12
2 Turtle Doves X 11 " = 22
3 French Hens X 10 " = 30
4 Calling Birds X 9 " = 36
6 Geese-a-laying X 7 " = 42
7 Swans a swimming X 6 = 42
8 cows for milking X 5 = 40

thus: 12+22+30+36+42+42+40= 224 bloomin animals... eek! talk aboua a menagerie!!!


humans:
12 drummers drumming = 12
11 pipers piping X 2 = 22
10 lords a-leaping X 3 = 30
9 ladies dancing X 4 = 36
8 maids-a-milking x 5 = 40

and now 12+22+30+36+40 = 140 humans, quite the staff to mantain...


Musical Instruments:
11 pipers piping (whether it's a single pipe they're tooting has yet to be determined) X 2 = 22
12 Drummers Drumming (one drum apiece? or one massive drum they're all banging on to drive everyone insane???)

22+12= 34 instruments...

and twelve pear trees (far from an orchard...) soon to be picked apart as more and more partridges come to roost... by the end of the 12 days, I'd assume only 8 are left standing...




The real question is the monetary value of such splendid gifts... a website (http://www.pncbank.com/12days/) has it listed at a cost of $54,951.31 US plus tax... however, they're numbers are based on the system I first used... (only one offering of each.. not compunded acceptances...)

here's a more realistic picture:

12 partridges @ $15 ea: $180.00
12 pear trees @ $62.50 ea : $750.00
22 Turtle Doves @ $58.00 ea. : $1276.00
30 french hens @$15 ea: $450.00
36 'calling birds' @ $400 a pop: $14,400.00
40 golden rings @ $361.25 ea: $14,450.00
42 geese @ $150.00 ea : $6,300.00
42 swans @ $3,500 ea : $147,000.00


already, we're seriously in debt... $184,606.00 is a lot to contend with, and we haven't gotten to the humans!!! since slavery is now illegal, and as members of any union would strike if we pushed them too hard, we'll only assume that instead of buying the humans, we're employing them for an 8-hour workday... and they bring their own "tools of the trade"

8 maids for 5 eight-hour days at roughly $8 and hour: $2,560.00 just for some milk to go with santa's cookies.

9 ladies for 4 eight hour days... dancers usually get paid fairly well, as profesionals, I'd assume they charge roughly $25 an hour... so that makes $7,200 for our happy ballerinas...

10 Lords a-leaping (while the thought of being able to hire nobility to jump and prance all day seems absurd, I'd surely pay to see it... although, a price is too hard to determine, so I'd just assume instead of lords, we're talking about people who do a lot of jumping, professional basketball players!!!) the average NBA player makes $2.6 million annually... or roughly $7,123 a day... luckily, you're only keeping them around for three days... (call it a two on two tournament... sell it to ESPN!!!) there's another $213,690.00 out of pocket...

Back to the world of performers... I know plenty of musicians who don't go by hourly so much as by the gig... $200.00 seems more than fair to many of my musician friends...
$200.00 X 11 pipers X 2 'days'= $4,400.00
$200.00 X 12 Drummers X 1 'day' = a $2,400.00 set of drum solos...


back to the total: roughly $414,856.00 on Christmas for your true love... not enough to really start an entire economic trend for the season... but the story alone would easily make headlines!!!

[Almightynoitall]

For the feast:

12 partridges, glazed in pear sauce...

22 smoked turtle dove ka-bobs!!! (http://dotclue.org/recipe/smoked-turtle-dove-kabobs)

30 Cornish Hens

(never tried calling birds... wouldn't be too tasty, I'd imagine... maybe use the feathers for garnish???)

40 napkin rings for the guests... (gotta make some use of them, right???

a jail term and a large fine for eating a canadian goose in Canada... (national bird) hehe... luckily, here in the states, they're fair game!!!

swan soup! (http://www.lanierbb.com/recipes/data/bk268.html)

cheese & ice cream from all the milk... and perhaps some good ol' steaks on the grill!!! RED MEAT!!!

[Kodiak Kid]

Oh! well done Almighty!! I considered going off into the world of economics just for fun but chose culinary instead. You have nailed it perfectly. But just for clarification, the song does go--->

On the first day ---I got this stuff
On the second day ----I got this stuff. So it clearly implies that the stuff you got on the second and succeding days is in addtion to the stuff you got on the preceding day(s).
So you really would be getting 12 pear trees. And I agree that they would probably be denuded in short order. Who (besides Zelda) would be able to plant them in December anyway?

[Kodiak Kid]

I would make some butter out of the cream and cheese out of the milk. Then I’d make a cheese omelet for an appetizer. Followed by a beef bisque. Then for the main course I’d serve stuffed partridges with pear glaze, served on a bed of pear tree leaves. For desert-------> Hagendaz`!!! (pear flavored, natch.)

[Zelda]

HEY! It was early Christmas morning and i hadnt had my sugar fix! 2 outta three aint too bad!!! And its too bloody hot to plant pear trees here at the moment!

[Artisan]

Almightynoitall gets the points for most work done... but did no one see or follow this link when I posted it last week? Must see for the definitive answer on the cost of 12 nights of Chistmas....


and here...

http://www.pncadvisors.com/cpi.html

you'll see that the 2003 Christmas price index is up to $65,264 - apparently the cost of swans is up, while golden rings is holding steady despite the jump in the gold market

[Almightynoitall]

Originally posted by Artisan
Almightynoitall gets the points for most work done...

WOOHOO!!! I Win!!! yay me...

I'm afraid those figures by financial consulting firms must be terribly skewed... I wonder where they found some of the numbers, (it's hard to admit, but I don't think you'll find 10 true lords-a-leaping on Ebay, or available through Monster.com... ever...) I'd be inclined to protest if 1. I had the time/interest and 2. It might make a difference...

Now, I think the numbers would be better if they could show THEIR work, and references to the prices of the special 'gifts'...