missouri boat ride

In IT: When you start a task but can't finish it because it triggers a deep stack of necessary supporting tasks; similar to shaving the yak.
In other usage: a long and complex swindle.

"I was trying to install tensorflow with gpu support, but first I had to install cuda toolkit, but to do that I had to install conda for Windows, but to do that I had to install....." ... etc. "I understand, you got taken on a Missouri boat ride"