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
Chase from Jacksonville, Florida, grew up in Sacramento, California, where kids played Rochambeau instead of rock, paper, scissors. Why the difference in names? Nobody knows. Folklorists call this a choosing game, and while the hand-game itself...
Susan from Virginia Beach, Virginia, shares the phrase her mother used when the kids refused to eat: It’ll grow hair on your back teeth. This supposed motivator likely blends two older traditions: a German idiom, Haare auf den Zähnen haben...