Question: The lights in Malcolm’s house are flickering, and he hopes that replacing all of his white lights with colored lights will make it stop. He buys 12 red lights, 3 times as many blue lights, and 6 green lights. If he still has 5 colored lights left to buy, how many white lights did Malcolm have initially?
Answer: Malcolm has bought 12 * 3 = 36 blue lights. This means he has bought a total of 12 + 36 + 6 = 54 colored lights. If he still needs to buy more lights, then he must have initially had 54 + 5 = 59 white lights. The answer is 59.

Question: Jerome bought 5 new toy cars last month. This month he bought twice as many so that he has 40 toy cars now. How many toy cars did Jerome have originally?
Answer: Jerome bought 5 x 2 = 10 toy cars this month. So he bought a total of 5 + 10 = 15 toy cars. Therefore, Jerome had 40 - 15 = 25 toy cars originally. The answer is 25.

Question: Jackson is buying chairs for his restaurant. He has 6 tables with 4 seats and 12 tables with 6 seats. How many chairs total does Jackson need to buy?
Answer: First find how many chairs Jackson needs for the four - seat tables by multiplying the number of four - seat tables by 4: 4 chairs / table * 6 tables = 24 chairs. Next find how many chairs Jackson needs for the six - seat tables by multiplying the number of six - seat tables by 6: 6 chairs / table * 12 tables = 72 chairs. Now add the number of chairs for the four - and six - seat tables to find the total number of chairs Jackson needs: 24 chairs + 72 chairs = 96 chairs. The answer is 96.

Question: Sharon wants to get kitchen supplies. She admired Angela's kitchen supplies which consist of 20 pots, 6 more than three times as many plates as the pots, and half as many cutlery as the plates. Sharon wants to buy half as many pots as Angela, 20 less than three times as many plates as Angela, and twice as much cutlery as Angela. What is the total number of kitchen supplies Sharon wants to buy?
Answer:
Angela has 6 + 3 * 20 = 66 plates. Angela has 1 / 2 * 66 = 33 cutlery. Sharon wants to buy 1 / 2 * 20 = 10 pots. Sharon wants to buy 3 * 66 - 20 = 178 plates. Sharon wants to buy 2 * 33 = 66 cutlery. Sharon wants to buy a total of 10 + 178 + 66 = 254 kitchen supplies. The answer is 254.