"catch the drift" is a correct and usable phrase in written English.
It is used to indicate that someone understands the general idea of what is being discussed. For example: The speaker gave a long and complicated explanation. Although it was difficult to understand, I think I catch the drift.
I lean forward to catch the drift of it.
Those of us who just didn't catch the drift of education were made to feel like failures and dropped by the wayside.
I love the way they sitand use their bodies to nuance what they say.I lean forward to catch the drift of it.
In a way that actually was not measured, admittedly, but we're all adult enough to catch the drift of these elaborate concepts.
Because written Mirandese resembles Spanish and Portuguese, I could at least catch the drift of the stories and essays in the journal – some of which were clearly personal and others which seemed to be recounting folk tales told by family or neighbors – stories of hens and monsters and shepherds and religion.
Players advance through a bracket that matches 16 players, then eight, then four, and then — you catch the drift.
Under the right conditions, they catch the drifting snow and present the shadow of a lost water-world from nearly two centuries ago.
Standing on Hillside Avenue in Jamaica, Queens, waiting for the Q-17 bus, watching in a store window as Jackie Robinson lifted a pop-up into the jet stream and the scrawny opportunistic second baseman of the Yankees, Billy Martin, floated over to catch the drifting ball, knee-high, to end the seventh-inning rally.
"I think Stewart was right in that he caught the drift of antipolitics," Matthews said.
A sumptuous retrospective of paintings and collages at the Acquavella Galleries catches the drift of a fine, shy temperament.
