persnickety

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Happy New Edition! Ring in the New Year with 
Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, Eleventh Edition.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/cgi-bin/book.pl?c11.htm&1
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The Word of the Day for December 31 is:

persnickety   \per-SNIK-uh-tee\   adjective 
     1 *a : fussy about small details : fastidious  b : having 
the characteristics of a snob 
     2 : requiring great precision 

Example sentence: 
     I love my friend Emma, but I also know how persnickety she 
can be, so I removed the grocery store cake from its plastic 
holder and brought it to her party on a fancy plate.

Did you know?  
     Persnickety people like things neat and tidy, but the 
etymology of "persnickety" doesn't provide the kind of clean, 
clear explanation that appeals to the fastidious. "Persnickety" 
was first documented in English in 1915 as an alteration 
of "pernickety," a word that has the same meaning. "Pernickety" 
goes back to the early 1800s. To be sure, nothing out of order 
there. Now let's sweep up the remains and tie the whole thing 
up -- but wait, we can't. The rest of the word's "history" ends 
up being useless clutter. Some say "pernickety" might be from a 
child's version of "particular"; others, that the "nick" part 
came from association with "knick-knack." But it's all pure 
conjecture, and no one knows for sure. 

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.