RAY: Hi, we're back. You're listening to Car Talk with us, Click and --
TOM: Wait a minute! Speak for yourself! You may be back.
RAY: We're Click and Clack the Tappet brothers, and we're here to talk about cars, car repair, and, duh, the answer to last week's Puzzler.
TOM: There was a Puzzler last week?
RAY: Yeah. This is from the poker collection.
TOM: Oh, that! The poker Puzzler! Now I re, why didn't you remind me?
RAY: I couldn't remember it myself until just now.
TOM: You were playing poker with your wife.
RAY: We were sitting at the kitchen table.
TOM: That was it.
RAY: And she says, I'd like to learn how to play poker. Can you teach me? So, I explained to her the ranking of the hands, you know, the highest hand being a royal flush, ace, king, queen, jack, ten, of one suit, and the lowest hand being nothing.
TOM: Nothing.
RAY: OK. So, anyway, I've got all the cards face up on the table, and she says, let's play a game with the cards like this. You pick five of the cards and I'll pick five of the cards, and we'll see who has the best hand.
TOM: And you said --
RAY: And I said, well, that seems pretty silly. We can see all the cards, so I'm going to pick a royal flush and you're going to pick a royal flush, and we're going to be tied every time. And she says, well, after you pick your cards, you can draw cards.
TOM: Ah.
RAY: You can throw away up to as many as five cards. You can throw them all away, or you can throw none of them away. So, I said, well, I'm not going to throw any away. I'm going to pick a royal flush, and you're going to pick a royal flush, and nobody's ever going to win.
TOM: Mmm-hmm.
RAY: And she says, well, let me pick first.
TOM: Mmm-hmm.
RAY: I said, well, go ahead.
TOM: Yeah.
RAY: She does. She wins.
TOM: Really?
RAY: What hand does she pick?
TOM: I have to say that I, I did ponder this during the week, but I immediately escaped everything, and I forgot about it.
RAY: Well, I think the only hand that guarantees her a winner --
TOM: Is to pick four tens.
RAY: Four tens.
TOM: Huh?
RAY: If she picks four tens, no matter what I pick, she will always wind up with a better hand, because she can get a ten-high straight flush, and the best I can do is a nine-high straight flush Ñ a straight flush beating four of a kind. So, if she picks four tens and I pick four aces, four aces loses to ten, nine, eight, seven, six of, say, hearts, for example.
TOM: Yeah. And it's not possible for you, knowing that that's what she's going to doÉ
RAY: Well, she does it first.
TOM: ...to prevent her from getting, so she picks the four tens, and you see her do that, right?
RAY: Right.
TOM: Why don't you pick...
RAY: So, I can go ahead and pick the nine of clubs, the eight of spades, in which case, if I do that...
TOM: If you do that, then she cannot get a ten-high flush, straight flush.
RAY: Yeah, but neither can you.
TOM: Neither can you.
RAY: Yeah. So she wins. I think that's the only, I may be wrong, but I think that's...
TOM: Where did you get this Puzzler? Did you make it up?
RAY: I don't remember.
TOM: You don't remember, my foot! You stole it! You know you did! It's very good, though.
RAY: So, do we have a winner?
TOM: Yeah. The winner is Lee Arlger from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and for having his or her answer selected at random from among the thousands or two correct answers that we got, you, Lee, will get a $25 gift certificate to the Car Talk Shameless Commerce Division on our Web site, and with that $25 gift certificate, you can get 5/8 of a Car Talk jacket. Pick any 5/8 you want. I think I would go with the sleeveless version.
RAY: Yeah. In that case, it's the Car Talk vest.
[ Car Talk Puzzler ]
