High Value Xmas Presents

We are getting to that time of year again. The other day while doing an unrelated list I found a word which referred to a nun whose duty it was to keep an eye on the younger nuns in the convent. The really good thing was that it contained both the letters X and Z. What better Xmas present could there be than to be able to play a word with both of those two letters?

So the quiz this week is just to list as many legal scrabble words as you can think of that have got both X and Z. All words are to be from 3 to 8 letters long.

There are 23 words possible, although it is true that you would need a blank for one of them because it has a 2nd Z.

Don’t forget that some words will be related because it is the same word with a plural or past tense. They all count as separate words as long as they are not more than 8 letter long.

OK. Stop here if you want to try the quiz. These are all the answers:

EXAHERTZ One quintillion hertz

EXORCIZE To free of an evil spirit

FUZZBOX A device to distort the sound of an electric guitar

MAXIMIZE To make as great as possible

OXAZEPAM A tranquillising drug

OXAZINE A chemical compound

OXAZINES

OXAZOLE A liquid chemical compound

OXAZOLES

OXIDIZE To combine with oxygen

OXIDIZED

OXIDIZER

OXIDIZES

ZAX A chopper for trimming slate

ZAXES

ZELATRIX The nun that I have mentioned in the preamble

ZEUXITE A brittle ferriferous aluminosilicate

ZEUXITES

ZEX A chopper for trimming slate

ZEXES

ZOOTAXY Systematic zoology

ZOOTOXIC Relating to a zootoxin

ZOOTOXIN A poison derived from an animal

Seeing FUZZBOX made me wonder why FUZEBOX wasn’t there. On checking I discovered that although FUSE and FUZE are both allowable, and are listed as a detonating device, you can’t have either FUSEBOX or FUZEBOX

The other anomaly is why is EXORCIZE good, but EXERCISE has to be spelled with an S? If you get EXERCISE down look out for a chance to make it SEXERCISE!

Happy Scrabbling

Patrick