Pluralizing With X

"French words," remarked Shameless Shirley, "seem to have a bunch of letters you don't even pronounce."

"I just like them because they get rid of excess vowels," I explained. In my previous turn I had played the word TOILE (pronounced twal) across the board and I was now looking for a way to hook another letter onto it. Gazing at my R, I muttered, "I wonder if 'twaler' [TOILER] is a word. You know, like a person who weaves linen."

Laughing, Shirley replied, "It's a word alright, but I think you mean 'toyler,' like a peasant who toils in the fields."

English may be the hardest language in the world to learn, and I place the blame squarely on the shoulders of William the Conqueror. When the Normans succeeded in invading the Anglo-Saxons a millennium ago, William encouraged his men to marry the local women. A few generations later, the Teutonic language of the isle and the Romantic language of Gaul, each with very different pronunciations and letter combinations, had meshed into the beginnings of a totally new English.

Nowadays, modern words can be very difficult to pronounce without prior knowledge. The idea that TOIL and TOILE have such divergent pronunciations just because of the addition of a silent E is a very hard concept for native speakers, let alone a person learning English later in his/her life.

Some words, despite the years of melding, still appear to be more French than English.

A portmanteau is a large carrying case for clothing and other necessities that unfolds into two equal parts. It is also defined as a word that is a mash-up of two different words. For example, LIGER is a portmanteau word that combines LION and TIGER. The X at the end of PORTMANTEAU pluralizes it. In French, certain words that end in U take an X instead of an S to indicate more than one. Some of those forms made there way into English.

This week's list contains all the English words of six letters and under that can be pluralized with an X. You may notice that many of these forms can also take the normal S plural as well; however, both the S and the X are pronounced with the same "z" sound. Could this language get any more confusing? Unfortunately, it does.

ADIEU, n., pl. -S or -X, a farewell

BATEAU, n., pl -X, a flat-bottomed boat

BEAU, n., pl. -S or -X, a boyfriend

BIJOU, n., pl. -S or -X, a jewel

BUREAU, n., pl. -S or -X, a chest of drawers; an office; a department of government

COTEAU, n., pl. -X, a highland above a valley

EAU, n., pl. -X, water

GATEAU, n., pl. -S or -X, a fancy cake

JEU, n., pl. -X, a game

MILIEU, n., pl. -S or -X, an environment

RESEAU, n., pl -S or -X, a network; a color filter for a camera

-Jiff Z. Moneyer

Words With Two or More I's

By the expression on her face, I could tell that Shameless Shirley was looking for a play that would use all of her tiles. Her eyes darted back and forth as she arranged and rearranged anagrams in her mind. She possessed only common, one-point letters:

E R N A I T I

After considering the play VAINER with a V already on the board, Shirley reluctantly chose DETAIN which grabbed up a double word score. "I can see some six-letter words," she exclaimed, "but
I can't think of one that uses the extra I."

"There is one word," I informed her. "Think physics." Scroll to the bottom to find the answer.

My least favorite vowel to draw in Scrabble is I. It is not very hard to use just one since it is the third most common letter (only E and S are in more words), but using two or more at the same time is a real challenge. It seems like you need a college degree in an applied science to know these words. In addition, unlike every other vowel, there are no three-letter moves that contain 2 I's. Nevertheless, there are a few different ways to rid your rack of excess I's. Consider the following hypothetical game.

If I had a nightmare about Scrabble, this is the board that would inhabit it. Luckily the chances of this board occurring in a regulation game are astronomically low, however it does illustrate a some good examples of science words and suffixes that may be quite useful the next time you need to get rid of some I's. Here are just a few of them.

-IC Words: For the most part, words that end with -IC form adjectives that pertain to the root word (IDIOTIC, ACIDIC, etc.). In chemistry, an -IC word denotes a chemical element with a higher concentration of oxygen atoms per molecule than one with the suffix -OUS; thus, nitrous acid (HNO2) has a lower oxidation number than nitric acid (HNO3).

-IN Words: Once again, this suffix relates to chemistry, forming a wide variety of names for different compounds. These chemicals include proteins (RICIN), dyes (ALIZARIN), and flavorings (VANILLIN).

-ITIS Words: This medical suffix denotes an inflammation of a particular body part. IRITIS is an inflammation of the iris; CARDITIS is an inflammation of the heart.

Finally, this week's list contains four-letter words that have I's as their second and fourth letters. Sometimes a game presses you to make a move that ends with an I, so it's always good to have a few short words up your sleeve to fill the spot.

BIDI, n., a thin cigarette from India

HILI, n.pl. of HILUS, an opening in a body organ

KIWI, n., a flightless bird; a fruit

LIRI, n.pl. of LIRA, a monetary unit of Malta

MIDI, n., a skirt that ends mid-calf

MINI, n., a smaller version of something

MIRI, n.pl. of MIR, a Russian peasant commune

NIDI, n.pl. of NIDUS, an animal nest; a birthplace

NISI, conj., if not; unless; except

PIKI, n., a bread made of blue cornmeal

PILI, n., a Philippine tree; n.pl. of PILUS, a hair or hairlike structure

TIKI, n., a carved image of a Polynesian god

TIPI, n., alternate form of TEPEE, a conical Native American tent

TITI, n., an evergreen shrub, a South American monkey

ZITI, n., a tubular pasta

-Jiff Z. Moneyer

ɐıʇɹǝuı :ɹǝʍsu∀

Opening Move

Shameless Shirley, my good friend and constant word game companion, is a much happier player when she has the first turn in a game of Scrabble. If a draw for play order goes my way three or more games in a row, she begins to question the very idea of probability. "It's not fair," she sighs, "you always get to go first." My answer is always the same. "Don't forget the first scene of 'Rosencrantz and Guilenstern Are Dead.'"




Certainly there is an advantage to going first in a game. The opening move receives an automatic double word score, a word of five letters or more will get an additional double letter score, and there is no need to worry about where to put your tiles. The board is a blank slate just waiting for you to set the tone and tempo. The tough part becomes forcing a higher scoring tile toward either the beginning or the end of the word. Let's take an example:

T W E L T A S

There are many different plays here, but the W is the only letter worth more than one point so it is important to get it to the beginning or end of the word for maximum scoring. This particular example has no five-letter words that end in W, but try to find five five-letter words that begin with it. There is also one six-letter word and one-seven-letter word. Answers are at the bottom.

The opening move may be the easiest time to use all your tiles at once because you don't have to worry about hooking your word to anything else, but you have to have a pretty thorough vocabulary of old, obsolete, and obscure words if you want to take advantage very often. Consider the highest scoring opening move in the game.

If you are ever lucky enough to have this 128 point play, you may not even know it. It is a very odd combination of letters. The word is an alternate plural spelling of muzhik or mujik which is defined as a Russian peasant. It is also an archaic term that refers to the time before the Bolshevik Revolution.

Even though you will probably never be able to pull off one of these rare plays I will close with a list of the eight highest scoring starting plays just in case. Lady Luck may surprise you.

MUZJIKS, n.pl., a Russian peasant, 128 points

BEZIQUE, n., a card game, 124 points

CAZIQUE, n., a tropical bird; a Latin American tribal leader, 124 points

MEZQUIT, n., a deciduous tree, 124 points

KOLHOZY, n.pl., a collective farm in Russia, 122 points

SOVKHOZ, n. a state owned farm in the former Soviet Union, 122 points

ZINKIFY, v., to coat with zinc (an element), 122 points

ZOMBIFY, v., to turn into a zombie (undead creature), 122 points

-Jiff Z. Moneyer

  sǝlʇʇɐʍ 'ǝlʇʇɐʍ 'sʇlǝʍ 'slɐǝʍ 'sʇʇɐʍ 'ǝʇsɐʍ 'sǝlɐʍ :sɹǝʍsu∀