winter rat
- noun
- Informal
:
ratón de invierno
- During January, Jenna admits she turns into a true winter rat and barely goes outside.
Examples
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My neighbors jokingly call me a winter rat because I refuse to leave the fireplace in cold weather.
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As a winter rat, he stocks up on books and snacks for the long snowy months.
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I'm such a winter rat during the cold months.
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Many people become winter rats when temperatures drop.
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As a winter rat, he loves staying indoors with a good book when the cold weather arrives.
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Jenna says she transforms into a winter rat in January, spending all her time cozy at home.
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My friends call me a winter rat because I prefer watching movies inside rather than braving the frigid air.
Synonyms
1
8.3
A person who stays home and avoids going out in winter
Surface Forms
Morphology
winter + rat
Knowing 'winter' and the common sense of 'rat' (a small rodent) gives a loose hint — 'winter rat' suggests a rat in winter — but the leap to meaning 'a person who stays indoors all winter' relies on a non-standard, metaphorical extension of 'rat' to mean a homebound person and is not a conventional, compositional pattern. This makes the expression partially inferable but not reliably predictable for a B1 learner without prior exposure or cultural knowledge.
Etymology
The name winter rat may come from the image of a small rat staying inside a warm place during winter, hiding from the cold and gathering food. So, the phrase now means 'a person who spends most of the winter indoors to avoid the cold'.