HALCRO (n.)

An adhesive fibrous cloth used to hold babies' clothes together. Thousands of tiny pieces of jam 'hook' on to thousands of tiny-pieces of dribble, enabling the cloth to become 'sticky'.

HALIFAX (n.)

The green synthetic astroturf on which greengrocers display their vegetables.

HAMBLEDON (n.)

The sound of a single-engine aircraft flying by, heard whilst lying in a summer field in England, which somehow concentrates the silence and sense of space and timelessness and leaves one with a profound feeling of something or other.

HAPPLE (vb.)

To annoy people by finishing their sentences for them and then telling them what they really meant to say.

HARBLEDOWN (vb.)

To manoeuvre a double mattress down a winding staircase.

HARBOTTLE (n.)

A particular kind of fly which lives inside double glazing.

HARPENDEN (n.)

The coda to a phone conversion, consisting of about eight exchanges, by which people try gracefully to get off the line.

HASELBURY PLUCKNETT (n.)

A mechanical device for cleaning combs invented during the industrial revolution at the same time as Arkwright's Spinning Jenny, but which didn't catch on in the same way.

HASSOP (n.)

The pocket down the back of an armchair used for storing two-shilling bits and pieces of Lego.

HASTINGS (pl.n.)

Things said on the spur of the moment to explain to someone who comes into a room unexpectedly precisely what it is you are doing.

HATHERSAGE (n.)

The tiny snippets of beard which coat the inside of a washbasin after shaving in it.

HAUGHAM (n.)

One who loudly informs other diners in a restaurant what kind of man he is by calling for the chef by his christian name from the lobby.

HAXBY (n.)

Any garden implement found in a potating shed whose exact purpose is unclear.

HEATON PUNCHARDON (n.)

A violent argument which breaks out in the car on the way home from a party between a couple who have had to be polite to each other in company all evening.

HENSTRIDGE (n.)

The dried yellow substance found between the prongs of forks in restaurants.

HERSTMONCEUX (n.)

The correct name for the gold medallion worn by someone who is in the habit of wearing their shirt open to the waist.

HEVER (n.)

The panic caused by half-hearing Tannoy in an airport.

HIBBING (n.)

The marks left on the outside breast pocket of a storekeeper's overall where he has put away his pen and missed.

HICKLING (participial vb.)

The practice of infuriating teatregoers by not only arriving late to a centre-row seat, but also loudly apologising to and patting each member of the audience in turn.

HIDCOTE BARTRAM (n.)

To be caught in a hidcote bartram is to say a series of protracted and final goodbyes to a group of people, leave the house and then realise you've left your hat behind.

HIGH LIMERIGG (n.)

The topmost tread of a staircase which disappears when you've climbing the stairs in the darkness.

HIGH OFFLEY (n.)

Gossnargh (q.v.) three weeks later.

HOBBS CROSS (n.)

The awkward leaping manoeuvre a girl has to go through in bed in order to make him sleep on the wet patch.

HODDLESDEN (n.)

An 'injured' footballer's limb back into the game which draws applause but doesn't fool anybody.

HODNET (n.)

The wooden safety platform supported by scaffolding round a building under construction from which the builders (at almost no personal risk) can drop pieces of cement on passers-by.

HOFF (vb.)

To deny indignantly something which is palpably true.

HOGGESTON (n.)

The action of overshaking a pair of dice in a cup in the mistaken belief that this will affect the eventual outcome in your favour and not irritate everyone else.

HORTON-CUM-STUDLEY (n.)

The combination of little helpful grunts, nodding movements of the head, considerate smiles, upward frowns and serious pauses that a group of people join in making in trying to elicit the next pronouncement of somebody with a dreadful stutter.

HOVE (adj.)

Descriptive of the expression seen on the face of one person in the presence of another who clearly isn't going to stop talking for a very long time.

HOYLAKE (n.)

The pool of edible gravy which surrounds an inedible and disgusting lump of meat - eaten to give the impression that the person is 'just not very hungry, but mmm this is delicious'. Cf. Peaslake - a similar experience had by vegetarians.

HUBY (n.)

A half-erection large enough to be a publicly embarrassing bulge in the trousers, not large enough to be of any use to anybody.

HUCKNALL (vb.)

To crouch upwards: as in the movement of a seated person's feet and legs made in order to allow a cleaner's hoover to pass beneath them.

HULL (adj.)

Descriptive of the smell of a weekend cottage.

HUMBER (vb.)

To move like the cheeks of a very fat person as their car goes over a cattle grid.

HUMBY (n.)

An erection which won't go down when a gentleman has to go for a pee in the middle of making love to someone.

HUNA (n.)

The result of coming to the wrong decision.

HUNSINGORE (n.)

Medieval ceremonial brass horn with which the successful execution of an araglin (q.v.) is trumpeted from the castle battlements.

HUTLERBURN (n.archaic)

A burn sustained as a result of the behaviour of a clumsy hutler. (The precise duties of hutlers are now lost in the mists of history.)

HUTTOFT (n.)

The fibrous algae which grows in the dark, moist environment of trouser turn-ups.

IBSTOCK (n.)

Anything used to make a noise on a corrugated iron wall or clinker-built fence by dragging it along the surface while walking past it. 'Mr Bennett thoughtfully selected a stout ibstock and left the house.' - Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice, II.

IPING (participial vb.)

The increasingly anxious shifting from leg to leg you go through when you are desperate to go to the lavatory and the person you are talking to keeps on remembering a few final things he want to mention.

IPSWICH (n.)

The sound at the other end of the telephone which tells you that the automatic exchange is working very hard but is intending not actually to connect you this time, merely to let you know how difficult it is.