With jQuery outside events you can bind to an event that will be triggered only when a specific "originating" event occurs outside the element in question. For example, you can click outside, double-click outside, mouse-over outside, focus outside (and over ten more default "outside" events).

You get the idea, right?

The mouseoveroutside event, bound to a few elements

Just mouse around, and see for yourself!

test
a
b
c d e
f
g h i

The code

$(function(){
  
  // Elements on which to bind the event.
  var elems = $('#test, #test div, #test .bind-me');
  
  // Clear any previous highlights and text.
  $(document)
    .bind( 'mouseover', function(event){
      elems
        .removeClass( 'event-outside' )
        .children( '.event-target' )
          .text( ' ' );
    })
    .trigger( 'mouseover' );
  
  // Bind the 'mouseoveroutside' event to each test element.
  elems.bind( 'mouseoveroutside', function(event){
    var elem = $(this),
      target = $(event.target),
      
      // Update the text to reference the event.target element.
      text = 'Mouse-over: ' + target[0].tagName.toLowerCase()
        + ( target.attr('id') ? '#' + target.attr('id')
          : target.attr('class') ? '.' + target.attr('class').replace( / /g, '.' )
          : ' ' );
    
    // Highlight this element and set its text.
    elem
      .addClass( 'event-outside' )
      .children( '.event-target' )
        .text( text );
  });
  
});