rat
n.— «My face was quite round and my ears stuck out—and the beehive just accentuated that. I was, however, persuaded to wear it a few times for photoshoots and recall they used something called a “rat” to wrap the hair around. This was a piece of wire-wool the length of a hand and it kept everything in place.» —“Ooh beehive!” by Diana Appleyard, Stephanie Clarkson Daily Mail (United Kingdom) Oct. 4, 2006. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
In Cockney rhyming slang, apples and pears is a synonym for “stairs,” and dustbin lids means kids. Plus, sniglets are clever coinages for things we don’t already have words for. Any guesses what incogsneeto means? It’s the...
Janet in Montgomery, Alabama, reports that a day after she had surgery on her hand, the wound burst open, and a doctor noted that her wound dehisced. She’s used to hearing dehisce used in botany to mean the splitting of a plant structure to...