How To Use Frayed In A Sentence

It was issued to inspect the Velcro straps for frayed condition, cuts, and overall integrity.
Everyone is gibbering insanely, nerves frayed as showtime approaches.
As I happened to be sitting next the driver going to town on the 'bus, I told him my joke about the "frayed" shirts. The Diary of a Nobody
He had seen the transparent celluloid belt that held up my frayed cotton shorts. Times, Sunday Times
The prime minister used his keynote speech at Labour's spring conference in Gateshead to acknowledge it was largely his fault that his bond with the public had frayed.

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Frayed beige cotton curtains could be drawn at night in the bedroom and sitting room.
Denim shorts and skirts with frayed edges give an authentic feel. The Sun
Everything wasn't ruined, but his soul had been frayed a little further.
Consequently, the costs of strengthening and extending the probation service could be defrayed by charging a fee to the offending corporation.
I noticed that his cassock was a little frayed at the sleeves and short in the skirt. Incubus
The next day there were many frayed tempers in the village.
For example, the hall carpet is frayed in places and the lounge carpet is a bit faded. The Sun
Also, look for frayed cords, and don't forget to test outdoor electrical receptacles.
Down La Canebière I stroll, heading for the glinting, faraway turquoise eyespot of the Old Port, following women dressed in ankle-length raincoats and Islamic head scarves, long-faced men in frayed djellabas and knit skullcaps, gangly youths with scruffy beards. Sunstroked
Thus comes it that we take a final glance through two childish prison-houses, in far-separate Russian cities, wherein a youth and a maiden lie nightly dreaming the same dreams: one of them a spirit already bonded to the service of mind under the whip of circumstance: destined to storm rocky heights, from which hard-won eminences he shall command great views of sweeping plains and far-off mountain ranges; the other a pretty chrysalis on the eve of her change into a butterfly of butterflies; who is, nevertheless, to attempt flights overhigh and overfar for her frail wings; venturing to unfriendly lands whence she must return with frayed and tired pinions and a bruised and bleeding little soul. The Genius
He was wearing a long, ragged shirt with a cut in the sleeve and a frayed edge.
The Unemployment stats will not turn around inside a time-frame of the current administration, as rehires will be defrayed by elimination of Underemployment -- this means an additional five hours per average workweek, Workweek stats overreport actual hours worked: claiming in excess of 43 hours, when there is a actual Workweek of only about 37 hours. Meltzer on the Labor Market, Arnold Kling | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty
Twenty thousand dollars will be defrayed for the expense.
After a weekend of each other's company, nerves had become frayed.
frayed cuffs
I had to boil up the water in an old kettle with a frayed wire.
Pockets are roughly sewn or simply ripped out and the pre-worn look includes frayed edges, rips, cuts and laser-etched age marks.
Their stories tell of displacement, of the struggle to restore the frayed fabric of a collective history, to retrace threads that have been lost and unravelled.
He had seen the transparent celluloid belt that held up my frayed cotton shorts. Times, Sunday Times
Altair reached into his vest pocket and pulled out a stained, frayed handkerchief.
As we re-engage in the peace process and rebuild frayed ties with our allies, what should a democratic president ask of our allies in return?
But overdo it and you may end up with frayed nerves, a short attention span and the jitters. The Sun
The clouds in the nursing home corridors, sky-open springlike after a bathe and forgotten, in a frayed blue dressing-gown beside an osiery. Archive 2010-04-01
The cuffs on his shirt were frayed and his omnipresent tweed jacket had patched holes.
Chris then waited four seconds before resuming his verbal assault on Patrick's frayed nerves.
Alliances that frayed or hot products that take longer than expected to reach primetime linger on the minds of everyone who has been at a few of these confabs.
I didn't catch any frayed bows, just furrowed brows. Times, Sunday Times
Unspoken, unmentioned, was the reality the that the domestic consensus for the war, so clear in the wake of 9/11, has frayed, is broken, and absent another terrorist tragedy could never be reassembled with the strength it once possessed. Discourse.net: Mr. Obama's War -- And Ours
The erratic supply often fuel the frayed tempers.
He and his wife Susan “went to Australia … and toured there, but a great deal of the initial cost of getting there and back was defrayed by Clarion South, who wanted me to teach, so I guess that was work-related, or at least SF-related.” Kristine Kathryn Rusch » 2009 » April
It was an approach that betrayed the frayed confidence of a side who have won only one of their past 24 championship matches. Times, Sunday Times
The top was black and sleeveless, with fishnet covering my stomach up to the frayed hem of the fabric that made the actual shirt part.
Not only were they mismatched in color, but they were frayed on the ends and had various holes on the sleeves.
Haggard, frayed and cadaverously pale with his eyes sunk somewhere deep in the back of his skull, in the final scene he looks like someone who is about to die.
I am on the fringes - but refusing to get frayed.
When tempers are frayed or feelings hurt you need to spell out that you are apologising. The Sun
Stitch two burlap rectangles together, with the top left open and frayed.
The very web of life on which we depend is being ripped and frayed. Eco-Justice
Delicately frayed shirts, skirts and dresses are formfitting and highlight the womanly curves we've been blessed with.
There are still banners, now frayed and weather-worn, hanging from overpasses.
Cyclists, horse carts, two-wheelers, three-wheelers and loaded lorries all jostled for their bit of space while horns blared and tempers got increasingly frayed.
When these unhappy men began thus to stir, they of London, except such as were of their band, were greatly affrayed. Chronicle and Romance (The Harvard Classics Series)
Oh noes, ai juss merembered teh penguin in the bloos bruvverz adn iz bery bery affrayed! DEVINE ORDER OF CATZ - Lolcats 'n' Funny Pictures of Cats - I Can Has Cheezburger?
It is not without a certain degree of romantic pride that I look back and know that the first expenses of my son's life were defrayed from the price of that first creation of my brain; and before that child was two years old, I had procured for my husband, – (for the husband who has lately overwhelmed me, my sons, and his dead patron with slander, rather than yield a miserable annuity) – a place worth a thousand a year; the arduous duty of which consisted in attending three days in the week, for five hours, to hear causes tried in the simplest forms of law. English Laws for Women in the Nineteenth Century
Its guttery flare exposed a bed, with a thin mattress and a skimpy cover, shoved close up under the sloping wall; a sprained chair on its last legs; an old horsehide trunk; a shaky washstand of cheap yellow pine, garnished forth with an ewer and a basin; a limp, frayed towel; and a minute segment of pale pink soap. The Escape of Mr. Trimm His Plight and other Plights
She needed to sort out her frayed, perplexing emotions with the help of someone she loved and trusted.
Zubair was a wreck, a ball of frayed nerves with a stomach full of bubbling acid that had resulted in a scorching pyrosis. Vince Flynn Collectors’ Edition #2
A flour sack covering his face, the frayed corner of it tucked under his collar.
The call came at a meeting of police and villagers, during which tempers frayed as residents complained of a lack of police presence and support.
The fabric is constructed so it has rows of "frayed" ruffles - but they are really the edges of the fabric. Cherie of Shrimpton Couture - A Dress A Day
Also, any frayed strings of kevlar should be trimmed from the wicks. Hooping.org | Blog | Fire Up! Fire Hooping With Kahunahula
Denim shorts and skirts with frayed edges give an authentic feel. The Sun
Before me is not the debonair, gentleman writer I had expected but an unshaven, dishevelled man with wild, curly grey hair and frayed clothing.
Tempers are frayed in every Milltown household.
And he warns that people need to take steps to avoid long term mental health problems caused by seasonal frazzled nerves, frayed tempers, and over-indulgence.
Something that smelled like rotting flesh on burned toast was shuffling toward them, fungoid arms extended, eyeballs dangling from the ends of raw, frayed strings. The Lives of Felix Gunderson
Because tempers are already frayed, you're reluctant to confront others on their excesses. Times, Sunday Times
When he gets closer we can see that one of his shirt cuffs is unbuttoned and the sleeve is frayed.
He had a long black coat that trailed the floor slightly, the edges torn and frayed, obviously often used.
He was labelled ‘Sunny Jim’, but he had a fierce temper, and his patience, despite his seemingly easy-going avuncular manner and soft West Country drawl, was easily frayed.
Nothing jarring, simply a sense of chronic neglect—plasterwork left unrepaired, a spiderweb crack running jagged down one pane of window glass, drapes frayed and left to fade in the sun. Earl of Durkness
The man had a worn, weathered face, he might have been a fisherman or a villager; he looked hard-up, in his frayed overcoat. COUP D'ETAT
I would also like to point out that cost effectiveness cannot be an argument against running these polling stations for a general election as the costs are defrayed by central government.
In the end I selected a pair of stout though well-worn trousers, a frayed jacket with one remaining button, a pair of brogans which had plainly seen service where coal was shovelled, a thin leather belt, and a very dirty cloth cap. THE DESCENT
I had to boil up the water in an old kettle with a frayed wire.
He freely permitted the officers under his command to undertake the task of geographical discovery, retaining their rank, pay, and batta, whilst the actual expenses of their journeys were defrayed by contingent bills. First footsteps in East Africa
Carefully trim away any frayed edges from around the hole. Collins Complete Books of Soft Furnishings
We've got some pictures we want to show you of what would probably best be described as frayed nerves at airports all over the country. CNN Transcript Mar 17, 2007
Jacket in An old favourite gets a makeover this season with boxy shapes, embellishment and frayed edges. The Sun
Replace cracked or frayed electrical appliance and extension cords.
Despite some frayed nerves, the group benefited from the sort of camaraderie that arises only out of mutually experienced adversity.
One man who didn't seem all that relaxed was the health minister who, after a mere three years serving as the cabinet punchbag, looks a little frayed around the edges.
He stopped at length to note a prisoner in the town pillory, when a promenader of somewhat frayed attire and a countenance which bore marks of dissipation looked at him closely. The False Chevalier or, The Lifeguard of Marie Antoinette
Then there's his weakness for jivey alliteration: "I was frayed, fraught, french-fried and frazzled. The Hilliker Curse: My Pursuit of Women by James Ellroy – review
The solution for all frayed nerves in our experience was to stop and go for a walk.
Then good night, lovely Blossom," he called gaily while he turned back into the bridle path which led like a frayed white seam over the pasture. The Miller Of Old Church
Ms. Lepore was trying to puzzle out why little bouclé jackets - and in particular a tweed plaid version with a boxy shape and frayed edges, a knockoff of a Chanel original - should be the surprise hit of the season…
He had to move now, ingress and egress before his nerves frayed and the last adrenalin dribbled away. THE LAST RAVEN
Softness emerged in flou with various artsy embroideries, and in a divine dress made from rows of frayed silk in ivory, brown and aqua.
It's one of those stuffy phrases coined by the bureaucrats upstairs, hunched at their desks with a drip on their nose and frayed cuffs and patched elbows, their chilblained feet squeezed into their cracked patent-leather shoes and a mug of cold tea beside them as they scratch the epitaph across the file in longhand, like vultures picking at the bones of a dead mission. Northlight
He had to move now, ingress and egress before his nerves frayed and the last adrenalin dribbled away. THE LAST RAVEN
During periods of racial discord, community leaders have headed to the statue to cool frayed tempers.
Maggie stepped up and started pulling at the frayed knots that were tied around his ankles.
This old jumper of mine is frayed at the sleeve cuff.
Because tempers are already frayed, you're reluctant to confront others on their excesses. Times, Sunday Times
With a snowy palm the woman took affrayed a taborine. Poems and Fragments
And ... a few days back, a clutch of seethe-heads affrayed a marine patrol on the Wildfoss, remember? The Day Of Their Return
The expenses of national parks are defrayed by the taxpayers.
It all died down, but not before leaving Amir's already fragile temperament somewhat more frayed.
Underground cables become frayed from aging, corrosive chemicals, overload or rats biting them.
And if not pjs it will be loose gym pants frayed at the hems, a floppy t-shirt and a baggy cardie - and slippers if it's cold. Writing wear: the writer's wardrobe
November 15, 2007 at 3:10 pm thx i tot so akshuly, but wuznt shure i iz not naetiv inglish speakur so stuf liek harbls get bai me im afrayed aye fizgig says: Lolwerdz & Cheezwerdz - Lolcats 'n' Funny Pictures of Cats - I Can Has Cheezburger?
Melt the frayed ends of the cord with your lighter.
He wore frayed jeans and cowboy shirts.
Denim shorts and skirts with frayed edges give an authentic feel. The Sun
The cost of the project will be defrayed by a government grant.
In the 1990s, when increasingly stringent regulations to protect the fisheries were being imposed, tempers among trawlermen who felt their livelihoods threatened often became frayed, leading to high-profile confrontations.
I'd frayed the edges of my jeans as that was the fashion in those days.
Quene and hir factioun nocht a litill affrayed, with all diligence departed from Edinburgh to Dumbar. The Works of John Knox, Vol. 1 (of 6)
The stairway carpet is so frayed it threatens to unravel.
Yet to me in the open air, most scantily draped and wearing a frayed, loopholed, and battered straw hat, the sunbath had been a pleasant and exhilarating indulgence in no way remarkable on the score of temperature. My Tropic Isle
He is attached to his frayed shirts and always eats up leftovers. Times, Sunday Times
A fixed star burns the edges of frayed identity.
Twenty thousand dollars will be defrayed for the expense.
Jacket in An old favourite gets a makeover this season with boxy shapes, embellishment and frayed edges. The Sun
Frayed news clippings from murder trials, blow-ups of spent bullets, and collages culled from medical textbooks adorn the corridors of the Connecticut State Forensic Science Laboratory.
She wrote a few days ago that she considered quitting her job as a columnist after six months because her nerves got frayed.
Jacket in An old favourite gets a makeover this season with boxy shapes, embellishment and frayed edges. The Sun
My baby cried for more than an hour that first night before she finally fell asleep, exhausted and frayed.
Her jeans are frayed, and her shining feet are shod in battered sandals.
When tempers are frayed or feelings hurt you need to spell out that you are apologising. The Sun
A flour sack covering his face, the frayed corner of it tucked under his collar.
The project may also include attempts to mend frayed relations between management and employees.
Aidan knew right away the man was homeless: he wore a rumpled, torn black suit that looked like he snatched it from a dumpster, and a frayed tie loosely knotted around his neck.
He is attached to his frayed shirts and always eats up leftovers. Times, Sunday Times
It was an approach that betrayed the frayed confidence of a side who have won only one of their past 24 championship matches. Times, Sunday Times
He had a brown hat on his head, and a dirty belcher handkerchief round his neck: with the long frayed ends of which he smeared the beer from his face as he spoke. Oliver Twist
Everything in the movie is old: every carpet is frayed, every book dog-eared, every scrap of metal rusted through.
Glover felt like a frayed old electrical cord that some one had just shoved into a wall socket.
Though it was a warm day, he was wearing his old faded high-necked sweater with a frayed shirt collar showing.
Beat’s outer trappings — black turtlenecks, cigarette pants, neckerchiefs, berets — is indebted less to Jack Kerouac and his wayward cohort, who slouched about in frayed flannel shirts, than to stylized interpretations in movies like “Funny Face” or the less well-known “Subterraneans,’’ a 1960 film based on a Kerouac novel about the kinky denizens of North Beach in San Francisco. August 2006
I have never been to the British Museum, so for me its leather chairs still creak under harrumphing old colonels with handlebar moustaches, wheezing tubercular poets in frayed brown sweaters, and Karl Marx. Secrets of the Crypt - Arthur Phillips talks about how he came to write The Egyptologist
She'd been desperate to see me, her voice frayed with anxiety. SKORPION'S DEATH
He had dutifully nurtured a six-hair goatee and frayed the bottom of his jeans.
Extra care has been taken to present a frayed and worn out look sought by the young and young at heart.
I can, quite flukily, produce a respectable salmon but it will be accompanied by charred fingers, mayonnaise where oil and egg sulk in separate corners of the bowl, frayed tempers and slammed fridge doors.
While Paris and Berlin are eager to repair frayed transatlantic relations, the Europeans do not want to be dictated to by Washington.
For example, the hall carpet is frayed in places and the lounge carpet is a bit faded. The Sun
A few white blooms remain, like frayed butterflies clinging to the plant's beanlike stalk. Times, Sunday Times
It was surely not coincidental that tempers frayed on the hottest, most humid day of the tour so far. Times, Sunday Times
The gentlemen of the countries, knights and squires, began to doubt, when they saw the people began to rebel; and though they were in doubt, it was good reason; for a less occasion they might have been affrayed. Chronicle and Romance (The Harvard Classics Series)
The interviews were with nearly two dozen Saudis, from a bejeweled prince of the royal court, sipping coffee at a cafe, to a truck driver wearing a frayed caftan, clutching a bag of onions at a local supermarket.
I saw several comments about dowdy dresses being discouraging, but can a dress, any dress, be any dowdier than a pair of dirty jeans with frayed cuffs dragging on the floor picking up dust, with the clunky horrid dirty sports shoes? Blue Dress Painting
This old jumper of mine is frayed at the sleeve cuff.
I didn't catch any frayed bows, just furrowed brows. Times, Sunday Times
Near the bottom of one box, he discovered a frayed leather harness, studded collar and leash.
A cup of coffee and a bun to soothe her frayed nerves felt very necessary. DEATH AND TRANSFIGURATION
A sudden flush of self-consciousness twitches at the ubiquitous teenage angst and she tugs at the frayed hem of her puffball skirt.
I didn't catch any frayed bows, just furrowed brows. Times, Sunday Times
The clothing she wore last year is tattered and frayed, but still recognizable.
Media stocks were some of the heaviest fallers after publisher Pearson frayed nerves as it warned there was little sign of a let-up in the tough advertising conditions.
When they were voted off tempers frayed and there was a lot of shouting at each other. The Sun
He had seen the transparent celluloid belt that held up my frayed cotton shorts. Times, Sunday Times
Jacket in An old favourite gets a makeover this season with boxy shapes, embellishment and frayed edges. The Sun
The interviews were with nearly two dozen Saudis, from a bejeweled prince of the royal court, sipping coffee at a cafe, to a truck driver wearing a frayed caftan, clutching a bag of onions at a local supermarket.
The friction frayed the sleeve
Sam Shepard's three-hour epic, like much of his work, focuses on unhealed wounds and frayed male bonding.
My temper is frayed.
The mesh had frayed and become entangled in the nerves in my groin. Times, Sunday Times
It was a place where gray mists hid the tops of low, deep-green mountains, where redbone and bluetick hounds flashed through the pines as they chased possums into the sacks of old men in frayed overalls, where old women in bonnets dipped Bruton snuff and hummed "Faded Love and Winter Roses" as they shelled purple hulls, canned peaches and made biscuits too good for this world. Excerpt: All Over But The Shoutin' by Rick Bragg
Two ornate ghost pipefish sought refuge amongst the frayed strands, but these proved difficult to the unpractised eye; the divemasters knew exactly where to find them.
The noise was Paula opening the door, blue dawn light outlining the frayed edges of her hair.
The cheap, no-frills fix is to simply melt the end of the frayed shoelace with the lighter.
Replace frayed or cracked cords.
Nora turned back to the body and studied the edges of the flesh where the right leg must have been submerged in water; the visible tendons and ligaments looked frayed, and she could see a layer of adipocere beneath the skin—ordinary body fat transformed into a yellowish, waxy material—a common feature of preserved remains. FALSE MERMAID
Like me, it is a bit wrinkled and frayed at the edges but it recalls a moment of history in the life story of Britain's railway industry.
But our moral fabric - the basis of our interactions - can unravel and become frayed.
All of whom, we imagine, defrayed the costs of making an over-the-top music video with lots of pyrotechnic effects. Britney Spears debuts 'Hold It Against Me' video/infomercial
As we draw closer and closer to the time of departure the days grow more hectic and my nerves more frayed.
A sweep of light remained between frayed brocade curtains, without a gleam on the parquet floor.
I was wearing sneakers, a frayed pair of khaki trousers and a striped beach shirt.
Daughtry, to behold his captain, frayed and bleeding and breathing apoplectically, Michael raging in ghastly silence at the end of a mop, and a large Persian mother-cat writhing with a broken back. CHAPTER VI
New theropod integumental structures have been repeatedly dismissed as connective tissues, such as frayed collagen fibers or ossified tendons.
After the war, her costume ‘is covered, winter and summer, by a frayed macintosh… and she now wears a hat as well - a thing like a basket pulled down over her straying, pepper-and-salt hair’.
He had to move now, ingress and egress before his nerves frayed and the last adrenalin dribbled away. THE LAST RAVEN
School plays and concerts were great occasions, when nerves became frayed in the run-up to the big night.
Tempers inevitably became frayed, and at one point a fight broke out between a passenger and a member of staff.
Because health services are so expensive, the costs are defrayed over many years. The policy questions behind the legal questions
For instance, if the break is clean and not frayed, he knows the frame has been knocked off the wall.
Frayed nerves and tense muscles seemed to melt in the viscous liquid that poured out of the brass container suspended above me.
Thanks everyone for your kind comments on my solution to frayed cuffs and edges.
Jha restores our faith - increasingly frayed by cynicism - in the idealism of youth.
The result was gridlock and frayed tempers. Times, Sunday Times
The noise was Paula opening the door, blue dawn light outlining the frayed edges of her hair.
Their dreary humor seemed perfectly suited to the auditorium, with its frayed orange carpeting and comfortless chairs and flickering fluorescent lights.
Extension cords that looked frayed or suspicious were bound up in Scotch cellophane tape.
However, "Die Walküre" is an opera about love—the incestuous passion of the twins Siegmund and Sieglinde; Wotan's doomed love for his son, Siegmund; the deep father-daughter love of Wotan and Brünnhilde; and the frayed marital bond of Wotan and Fricka—all of which ultimately lead to the downfall of the gods. Where Intimacy Walked the Plank
With a snowy palm the woman took affrayed a taborine. The Poems and Fragments of Catullus
He had frayed the bottom of his jeans.
Jacket in An old favourite gets a makeover this season with boxy shapes, embellishment and frayed edges. The Sun
Do not use frayed or broken cords.
Past a turn on the landing (where a blue wasp lay dying on the windowsill) I reached a hallway carpeted in frayed sisal matting. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
These are the only physical signs of a gloomy air of potential violence that has led some counsellors to request police escorts to the metro, keep unlisted phone numbers and seek psychological help for their frayed nerves.
The mats were jammed close together, their frayed edges separated by only a few inches of white ice. THE BROKEN GOD
At his feet was a strip of dirt colored cloth, frayed at the edges.
I frayed my nerves thinking what Selina would do left in the office on her own. BLOOD IS DIRT
With nerves frayed and frustration pent up, we are at the edge.
He assured a frayed Richardson that he'd never see an attack that big.
And in this atmosphere of frayed nerves and short fuses, punk music was born. Times, Sunday Times
He had seen the transparent celluloid belt that held up my frayed cotton shorts. Times, Sunday Times
All a far cry from the frayed carpets, cashier screens and lunchtime queues we are used to. Times, Sunday Times
It was an approach that betrayed the frayed confidence of a side who have won only one of their past 24 championship matches. Times, Sunday Times
He would stare dumfounded at the erudite personage at the head of the class; Leander's bare feet were always carefully adjusted to a crack between the puncheons of the floor, literally "toeing the mark"; his broad trousers, frayed out liberally at the hem, revealed his skinny and scarred little ankles, for his out-door adventures were not without a record upon the more impressionable portions of his anatomy; his waistband was drawn high up under his shoulder-blades and his ribs, and girt over the shoulders of his unbleached cotton shirt by braces, which all his learning did not prevent him from calling "galluses"; his cut, scratched, calloused hands were held stiffly down at the side seams in his nether garments in strict accordance with the regulations. The Moonshiners At Hoho-Hebee Falls 1895
That much was true, but I'd overlooked just how much of the fabric has frayed or worn a little bit, exposing the pure-white threads underneath the blue.
So it was, that because of the unhappy leave-taking, no one noticed the insulation smoldering on the frayed wires in the old barn. None saw the first spark fall.

How To Use Frayed In A Sentence

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