Ken's POTW 970118

Cube Calendar

I have made a desk calendar out of six blocks. Each block has six faces. When read from left to right, they tell:

The current day of the week on one block, in one or two letters (M, Tu, W, Th, F, Sa, Su).
The date of the month on two blocks, one digit per block.
The abbreviation for the month on three blocks, one lower-case letter per block (jan, feb, mar, apr, may, jun, jul, aug, sep, oct, nov, dec).

What are the symbols (letter or number) on each face of each block?

Extra: What are the symbols if the month is shown in upper-case?

Source: Internet newsgroup rec.puzzles, with original additions. Used as Ken's POTD 2/17/94.

Solution:
Obviously, there are not enough sides to support all the letters and numbers, but since this is a physical problem, we can rotate or invert the blocks and get a new letter or number. Several people figured this out. Some of their solutions are shown below. I hope someone might enjoy making a set of these for themselves!

1st Cube: M(W), Tu, Th, F, Sa, Su 2nd Cube: 0,1,2,3,7,8 3rd Cube: 0,1,2,4,5,6(9) 4th Cube: j,g,p(d),m,f,o 5Th Cube: a,n(u),b,c,s,v 6th Cube: n(u),l,r,y,e,t
Ed Wirtz

Weekday cube: M/W Tu Th F Sa Su Date cube 1 : 0 1 2 3 4 5 Date cube 2 : 0 1 2 6/9 7 8 Month cube 1: j e y g o r Month cube 2: a f u v c s Month cube 3: n/u m b p/d t l
Bill Chapp

1st Cube: M/W Tu Th F Sa Su 2nd Cube: 0 1 2 3 4 5 3rd Cube: 0 1 2 7 8 6/9 4th Cube: f g j m o p/d 5Th Cube: a e t l v u/n 6th Cube: b r s c y n/u
Kenny Wright

1st Cube: M/W Tu Th F Sa Su 2nd Cube: 0 1 2 3 4 5 3rd Cube: 0 1 2 7 8 6/9 4th Cube: f g j m o p/d 5Th Cube: a b c l s u/n 6th Cube: e r v t y n/u
(Ken Duisenberg)

For the upper-case solution, the solutions I received either said it could not be done, or they pointed out that the characters have to be warped slightly to solve the problem. For example, from Bill Chapp:

OK, I've got the upper-case solution, too.  We let the C rotate 90
degrees to become a U, and we allow the months JVN and JVL (OK, it's
weak, but it's all I could get to work).

Month cube 1: J  E  R  Y  G  O
Month cube 2: A  F U/V S  T  D
Month cube 3: N  B  M  P U/C L

I (Ken) chose to make a warped T/Y combination, instead:

Month cube 1: J  F  M  P  V  U/C
Month cube 2: A  B  D  O  S  U
Month cube 3: E  G  L  N  R  T/Y

Mail to Ken

1st Cube: M(W), Tu, Th, F, Sa, Su 2nd Cube: 0,1,2,3,7,8 3rd Cube: 0,1,2,4,5,6(9) 4th Cube: j,g,p(d),m,f,o 5Th Cube: a,n(u),b,c,s,v 6th Cube: n(u),l,r,y,e,t		Ed Wirtz
Weekday cube: M/W Tu Th F Sa Su Date cube 1 : 0 1 2 3 4 5 Date cube 2 : 0 1 2 6/9 7 8 Month cube 1: j e y g o r Month cube 2: a f u v c s Month cube 3: n/u m b p/d t l		Bill Chapp
1st Cube: M/W Tu Th F Sa Su 2nd Cube: 0 1 2 3 4 5 3rd Cube: 0 1 2 7 8 6/9 4th Cube: f g j m o p/d 5Th Cube: a e t l v u/n 6th Cube: b r s c y n/u		Kenny Wright
1st Cube: M/W Tu Th F Sa Su 2nd Cube: 0 1 2 3 4 5 3rd Cube: 0 1 2 7 8 6/9 4th Cube: f g j m o p/d 5Th Cube: a b c l s u/n 6th Cube: e r v t y n/u		(Ken Duisenberg)