dice with death

dice with death

To do something very risky or dangerous. Of course he's taking out his motorcycle in the pouring rain—he's always dicing with death.
See also: death, dice
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.

dice with death

BRITISH
If someone dices with death, they take risks that put their lives in danger. Fishermen are constantly dicing with death. I dice with death almost every night crossing the road outside Maidstone Barracks station. Note: To dice means to play dice, or to gamble.
See also: death, dice
Collins COBUILD Idioms Dictionary, 3rd ed.

dice with death

take serious risks.
Dice with is used here in the general sense of ‘play a game of chance with’. In the mid 20th century dice with death was a journalistic cliché used to convey the risks taken by racing drivers; the expression seems for some time to have been especially connected with motoring, although it is now used of other risky activities. It gave rise to the use of dicing as a slang word among drivers for ‘driving in a race’, and it can be compared with dicey meaning ‘dangerous’, a word which originated in 1950s air-force slang.
See also: death, dice
Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary

ˌdice with ˈdeath

(informal) risk your life by doing something very dangerous: Racing drivers dice with death every time they race.
Dice means play dice or gamble.
See also: death, dice
Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary
See also:
  • dice
  • dance with death
  • between life and death
  • like death warmed over
  • sign (someone's) death warrant
  • sign someone's death warrant
  • from the dead
  • have (someone's) blood on (one's) head
  • be snatched from the jaws of death
  • be snatched out of the jaws of death
References in periodicals archive
The message is simple and stark: You dabble with heroin and you dice with death.
Don't dice with drugs
Four entertainers dice with death and do their best to sound like Elvis Presley, Roy Orbison, Eddie Cochran and Buddy Holly at a show which hits venues across Northern Ireland next month.
The Beautiful North: LISTEN UP, GOOD BUDDY!
NURSES nurse and cleaners clean, and for Tory ministers to think we can do without either in the NHS is to dice with death.
Dirty tricks
Electricity bosses are asking children across the North East not to dice with death in the summer holidays.
Electricity risk to youngsters
Divers are being warned not to dice with death off the North-East coast, after a series of incidents involving the potentially fatal condition known as 'the bends'.
Divers given 'bends' warning
So why is it that so many other cyclists, particularly in Dublin, would rather dice with death than wear one?
Voice Of The Irish People: A stamp of approval for An Post decision