shaggy

From shag +‎ -y.

• IPA^(key): /ˈʃæɡi/

  Audio (US):

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  Rhymes: -æɡi

shaggy (comparative shaggier, superlative shaggiest)

1. Having long, thick, and uncombed hair, fur or wool.

   a shaggy dog

   • 1900 May 17, L[yman] Frank Baum, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Chicago, Ill.; New York, N.Y.: Geo[rge] M[elvin] Hill Co., →OCLC:

     They waited until Dorothy awoke the next morning. The little girl was quite frightened when she saw the great pile of shaggy wolves, but the Tin Woodman told her all. She thanked him for saving them and sat down to breakfast, after which they started again upon their journey.

   • 1989, Octavia E. Butler, “Part III, Chapter 7”, in Imago, page 210:

     Away from the village, there was an enclosure containing several large animals of a kind I had not seen before—shaggy, long-necked, small-headed creatures who stood or lay at ease around their pen. Alpacas?

2. Having a surface like shaggy hair; with a rough nap.
3. (figuratively) Confused, muddled.
   • 2023 January 6, Charles Pulliam-Moore, “M3gan is a midrange delight about the horrors of 21st-century parenting”, in The Verge‎^[1], archived from the original on 15 September 2023:

     Universal and Blumhouse’s M3gan is exactly the right amount of ridiculous, which is why it can afford to be a little shaggy toward the end.

• “shaggy”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.