I should have thought of this sooner. Since they're ALREADY talking about purely imaginary apples, take n of these. Arrange them in the bucket so as to make a s

I should have thought of this sooner. Since they're ALREADY talking about purely imaginary apples, take n of these. Arrange them in the bucket so as to make a square of side length n (of said imaginary apples). The result is n^2 negative apples and a really bad math joke.