yak shaving

noun

Any apparently useless activity which, by allowing one to overcome intermediate difficulties, allows one to solve a larger problem.

“For quotations using this term, see Citations:yak shaving.”

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Meanings

nounyak shaving (uncountable)
  1. uncountableAny apparently useless activity which, by allowing one to overcome intermediate difficulties, allows one to solve a larger problem.

    I was doing a bit of yak shaving this morning, and it looks like it might have paid off.

  2. uncountableA less useful activity done consciously or subconsciously to procrastinate about a larger but more useful task.

    For quotations using this term, see Citations:yak shaving.

    1 more example

    I looked at a reference manual for my car just to answer one question, but I spent the whole afternoon with my nose buried in it, just yak shaving, and got no work done on the car itself.

Origin

Coined by Carlin Vieri in his time at the MIT AI Lab (1993–1998) after viewing a segment at the end of "The Boy Who Cried Rat!" (1991), the sixth episode of the first season of The Ren and Stimpy Show. The segment featured "Yak Shaving Day", a Christmas-like holiday where participants watch for the shaven yak to float by in his enchanted canoe.

Full word history & related roots →
Cite this entry
APA

yak shaving. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/yak%20shaving

MLA

“yak shaving.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/yak%20shaving. Accessed November 4, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “yak shaving,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/yak%20shaving.

Source: yak shaving on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.