hooking

1. 1
   verb

   Present participle and gerund of hook.

   He kept hooking his thumbs into his belt loops while he talked.

   Hooking the fish cleanly takes patience and a steady hand.

   Note

   The -ing form does double duty for every sense of hook, from fastening and fishing to crochet and figurative ensnaring. As a participle it builds the progressive (she was hooking yarn into a rug). As a gerund it names the action but keeps a verb's direct object (hooking the fish takes patience). Add 'the' and 'of' and you have the plain noun instead, with its own grammar.

2. 2
   noununcountable

   The action of using a hook to catch something or to fasten it in place.

   The hooking of heavy drapes onto a slender rod can bend the metal over time.

   Proper hooking of the safety latch prevents the load from slipping during transit.

   Similarfastening, attachment

   Oppositeunhooking

   Note

   The noun works as both a mass and a count word: the activity as a whole, or each catch tallied separately. Anglers do the tallying. Max Hunn's Fishing Adventures in Florida (2001) remarks on "a surprising number of foul hookings." As a mass noun it usually takes 'of' (the hooking of the drapes). As a count noun it takes numbers and plural verbs like any other.

3. 3
   noununcountable

   A penalty in ice hockey for using one's stick to impede or restrain an opposing player.

   The defenseman was whistled for hooking when he dragged his stick across the forward's arms.

   Repeated hooking late in the period handed the opposing team a long power play.

   Note

   A stick-sport term that travels: the same name covers the infraction in ice hockey, bandy and floorball. Officials treat it as uncountable (whistled for hooking, a penalty for hooking), though it can also be counted as a single hooking. The image is literal. The stick's blade becomes a hook that holds a player back instead of playing the puck or ball.

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