rat
n.— «A rat, in the parlance of Connecticut state legislators, is a bill or an amendment slipped in quietly to favor a friend or a special interest. Two Hartford City Council members recently schemed to sneak through a rat. They had the audacity to think they could get away with it.» —“While the cats were away…” Hartford Courant (Conn.) Oct. 20, 1998. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
The Merriam-Webster.com dictionary now includes an entry for TL;DR, also rendered as TLDR. It’s a speedy way of dismissing overlong text or introducing a shortened version of something. This useful locution also inspired AI;DR, short for AI;didn’t...
Advice about college essays from the winner of a top prize for children’s literature: Kelly Barnhill encourages teens to write about experiences that are uniquely their own, from a point of view that is theirs and no one else’s. Plus, why do we say...