strapped

"One of them lunged for me and tried to grab my camera, which was strapped around my neck," she said.

But soaring gold prices are helping change that calculus, he said—especially given how financially strapped many Americans feel.

While some returned in vehicles, most walked carrying belongings in bags strapped to their shoulders.

Several CEOs across the dining, retail, fashion and airline industries have said their middle-class customers are increasingly strapped, even as high earners keep on buying.

They were standing in broad daylight in a Brooklyn park playing the “ping pong shake,” a game in which they were to shake ping-pong balls out of an empty Kleenex box strapped to their waist.