monkeying
- 1Present participle of monkey.
He spent the whole weekend monkeying with the old motorcycle engine.
Quit monkeying around and get your chores finished before dinner.
Note
The -ing form does double duty. As a participle it builds progressives (he was monkeying with the engine), and as a gerund it names the activity itself (enough of your monkeying). It usually carries the informal sense of meddling and is followed by with or around: monkeying with something is tampering, while monkeying around is idle fooling about. When it means mimicking, it takes a direct object and no particle.
monkeying is a form of monkey
monkey, verb: To meddle or interfere, especially with something one shouldn't be handling. Full entry
- Spelling
- monkey → monkeying: add -ing
Use it in a sentence
Write your own sentence with monkeying, and AI will tell you whether it fits and which meaning you used.