Here are the answers to the three quizzes in Word Games for the Holidays.
I. Reversals
- (a) Knives, forks, and spoons.
(b) Pries in a sneaking or meddlesome manner: snoops. - (a) Committed an offense or fault: sinned
(b) Dennis the Menace - (a) Single-masted, rigged sailing vessels: sloops.
(b) Small cylinders on which thread or yarn is wound: spools. - (a) To cause to grow together again: reknit.
(b) An itinerant mender of household utensils: tinker. - (a) One who refuses to grant something: denier.
(b) Checked or halted a horse: reined. - (a) Fills with resolution or determination: steels.
(b) Frozen or partly frozen forms of rain: sleets. - (a) Children in school: pupils.
(b) To make a mistake: slip up. - (a) To laugh (a slang term): har-har.
(b) Marked by the enthusiastic expression of college spirit: rah-rah. - (a) Diversions or pastimes: sports.
(b) Leather bands for sharpening razors: strops. - (a) A 10-dollar bill: tenner.
(b) A substance that curdles milk: rennet.
II. Bewildering Beheadments
- A four-footed mammal: fox, ox
- These are associated with, but not part of, the face: tears, ears
- To move in a careless or headlong manner: stumble, tumble
- To make a low, heavy, rolling sound: grumble, rumble
- Related by blood: akin, kin
- A sharp point: spike, pike
- A bird: fowl, owl
- The husband of one's aunt: nuncle, uncle
- A mild oath: egad, gad
- To move in a leisurely or aimless fashion: ramble, amble
III. Nonpareil Nonpatterns
- Having numerous offshoots or boughs: multibranched
- Subserviently, obediently, submissively: subordinately
- Unperceivably, unascertainably: undiscoverably
- In a versatile manner, unusually skillfully: ambidextrously
- Acts of causing civil disorder or public unrest: troublemakings
- Spuriously imaginary or fictitious: pseudomythical
- Not subject to being protected by copyright: uncopyrightable
- Not subject to being demonstrated as false: undisprovable
- Acts of transforming streets into boulevards: boulevardings
- Pertaining to both water and air: hydropneumatic
