Question: Cordelia is dyeing her hair red. To get the color she wants, she first has to bleach her dark brown hair to blonde, and then she has to apply the dye. The whole process will take 9 hours. Dyeing takes twice as long as bleaching. How many hours will it take Cordelia to bleach her hair? Think carefully first, then make a decision:
Let H be the number of hours it takes Cordelia to bleach her hair. A dye treatment takes twice as long, so it takes 2H. Thus, bleaching and dying will take H + 2H = 3H = 9 hours. Therefore, it will take Cordelia H = 9 / 3 = 3 hours to bleach her hair. So the answer is 3.