python function seems to call itself then dot

Question

I am trying to understand the code in another answer:

import socket
import sys
import time

def get_lock(process_name):
    # Without holding a reference to our socket somewhere it gets garbage
    # collected when the function exits
    get_lock._lock_socket = socket.socket(socket.AF_UNIX, socket.SOCK_DGRAM)

    try:
        get_lock._lock_socket.bind('\0' + process_name)
        print 'I got the lock'
    except socket.error:
        print 'lock exists'
        sys.exit()

How do the two lines work which start with get_lock.? It's not like it's a class instance and you are using its methods..