The Oxford Thesaurus An A-Z Dictionary of Synonyms - passing adj.

1) disappearing, vanishing, ephemeral, brief, going, fading (away) , slipping away, short-lived, expiring, transient, transitory, temporary, momentary, fleeting, transitional, impermanent: I hope that Anne's obsession with acid rock is a passing fancy. 2) hasty, superficial, cursory, casual, quick, fleeting, brief, summary, abrupt, dismissive; glancing: The speaker paid only passing attention to those he disagreed with. 3 in passing. by the way, incidentally, by the by, parenthetically, en passant: I might mention, in passing, that my train was late owing to the strike. --n. 4) death, dying, demise, end, loss, expiry, expiration, dying out, extinction, disappearance, vanishment: Her passing is a great sorrow to all of us. Who thought we would live to see the passing of the steam engine?