clock-watching

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clock-watch·er

(klŏk′wôch′ər)

A person who pays close attention to the passage of time and is often eager for the time to pass, as at work or school.

clock′-watch′ing n.

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

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Noun

clock-watching - paying excessive attention to the clock (in anticipation of stopping work)

attending, attention - the process whereby a person concentrates on some features of the environment to the (relative) exclusion of others

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References in periodicals archive ?

Faber was quoted as stating: "little scratch tells the story of a day in the life of an unnamed woman, living in a lower-case world of demarcated fridge shelves and office politics; clock-watching and WhatsApp notifications.

Faber acquires UK and Commonwealth rights to debut novel by Rebecca Watson titled 'little scratch'

We can't all be" Illusionist and hypnotist Derren Brown, pictured "For 27 years this snarling, gum-chewing, clock-watching monster has tormented and blighted my life, so I felt like doing a conga round Beverly Hills when the news of his retirement broke" Arsenal fan and former Mirror editor Piers Morgan on retiring Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson "I'm a firefighter.

THEY SAID WHAT?

Hostage thrillers are all-too-often shrill affairs, with clock-watching screenwriters wringing maximum melodrama from spiraling disorder.