GeekDad Puzzle of the Week: The Orb of Yazoom

This week, wee Xerxes is troubled. Remember, email your solutions by 10:00 p.m. EST Thursday to be part of the random selection of correct answers and win a $50 gift code to ThinkGeek!
The holidays are upon us! All readers who check out the solution on Friday will receive a gift code for $10 off of their next ThinkGeek purchase of $30 or more. Puzzle after the jump.

Special thanks to ThinkGeek for providing our prizes!

Little Xerxes awoke in the middle of the night and his brother Yervant asked him what was wrong.

"I had that really weird dream again," he said. "I was shown the glowing Orb of Yazoom, and told that it would bestow wisdom and genius to any who possess it. But the orb was sitting directly ahead of me atop a pillar in the center of a deep square pit. I couldn’t reach it but I knew I had to have it."

"I had nothing with me, no tools, no equipment, or anything. There is nothing around me except for six wooden planks I knew measured 16 feet by 16 inches by 2 inches each. The pit’s sides though are 40 feet long and I calculate the distance from the middle of a side to the pillar to be little more than 19 feet. I sit in despair at the edge of the pit, unable to come up with any way to get the orb. Then I wake up. [sigh]"

Yervant, who is tired of listening to yet another story of Xerxes’ dream of pits and magic orbs tells him: "Fer cryin’ out loud, I’ll tell you how to get the stupid ball so we can both sleep in peace!"

What does Yervant say? How does Xerxes get the Yazoom Orb?

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