cat and mouse

1. uncountableA relationship in which two parties closely monitor and challenge one another in a suspicious or self-protective manner, often because each party is attempting to gain an advantage over the other.

   The Allied and the enemy submarine played a game of cat and mouse, checking up on each other's whereabouts and strategies.

   4 more examples

   The hackers played a cat and mouse game with the system administrators: the hackers kept trying new tricks, and the system administrators kept mounting electronic defenses.

   The Lizard however has first to contend with Akechi, Japan's number-one detective, who has been hired by the jeweler to protect his possessions. Akechi and the Lizard match wits and play cat-and-mouse while flinging weighty epigrams on crime, romance and beauty at each other.

   1992 February 2, S.H. Chua, “Cars, Guns and Go-Go Chicks”, in Gay Community News, volume 19, number 28, page 7

   In practice, however, it is extremely difficult to form a new union and the unions are engaged in a constant game of cat and mouse with the Registrar.

   2007, Marvin J. Levine, Worker Rights and Labor Standards in Asia’s Four New Tigers

   She loved their daily rides, the easy banter, the flirtatious game of cat and mouse they played.

   2014, Alison Weir, The Marriage Game

2. uncountableA form of attack in which the attacker toys with the victim by inflicting minor damage or letting the victim have futile hopes of escape before finally finishing the victim off.

   He was thinking how wonderful this game of cat and mouse was. He loved the game and the feeling of control he had over this poor innocent girl.

   2009, Judith C. Issette, Messenger of Death, page 34

   2 more examples

   The payback for that would come in the form of a prolonged game of cat and mouse, finally culminating in a deadly game that he had perfected years earlier.

   2009, Jarlon Magee, Travel in Fear

   She told of narrow escapes and a harried game of cat and mouse, until eventually she'd reached the darkened jungle in which Torys had found her.

   2014, Mark Derbyshire, New Worlds, page 30

3. uncountableA children's game in which one player (the "cat") attempts to break through a ring of players to catch another player (the "mouse") in the centre.

present singular third person cat and mouses · participle present cat and mousing · participle past cat and moused · past cat and moused

1. alternativeAlternative form of cat-and-mouse.

   And I've made up my mind not to be cat and moused any more.

   1931, John Collis Snaith, Indian Summer, page 39

   4 more examples

   She was attractive in her white uniform and Brown had cat and moused her for a long time without real enthusiasm.

   1965, Anthony Boucher, The Best from Fantasy and Science Fiction, page 193

   I am tired of being cat and moused, and for that reason I expect to vote against proposals which I am in favor of in principle, until we can have hearings on them, to determine whether they are economically viable and constitutionally sustainable.

   1967, United States. Congress. House. Committee on Ways and Means, Legislative History of H.R. 6950: 90th Congress, to Restore the Investment Credit and the Allowance of Accelerated Depreciation in the Case of Certain Real Property.

   ...K-Rl 30 N-B6, the game would be over unless we have more cat and mousing by 30 .

   1971, Chess Life & Review - Volume 26, page 441

   Careful not to draw deep blood, I cat and moused him for another moment or two as the audience stared in awe.

   2011, Max Hobby, Oshgomshee and the Princess Syleen