The singular of dice was originally “douse”, similar to mouse and mice, named for its usage to put out fires.

Today, most people have stopped lighting open flames in their homes but the practice of metaphorically blowing out a candle remained as a vestigial cultural artifact of being unable to literally douse a flame. There are still some diehard conservatives, however, who insist on doing this literally, which is believed to be the cause of the poor billionaires losing their California homes this winter.