Liberal Dictionary English Dictionary
adjective
- risky; precarious: a touch-and-go descent down the mountain.
- hasty, sketchy, or desultory.
noun
- a precarious or delicate state of affairs: It was touch and go there for a while during the operation.
- quick action or movement: the touch and go of city traffic.
adjective
- (touch-and-go when prenominal) risky or criticala touch-and-go situation
Uncertain or precarious: “The doctors told the patient that, even though her disease was in remission, from now on it was touch and go.”
Extremely uncertain or risky, as in It was touch and go after the surgery; we were not sure he’d survive it, or It was touch and go but they finally gave me a seat on the plane. This idiom implies that a mere touch may cause a calamity. [Early 1800s]