(quoting the internetz here)
The term is a back-formation from the 14th-century word peevish, meaning "ornery or ill-tempered."
"The precise derivation of "peevish" is uncertain, but it may be related to the Latin "perversus," meaning "reversed, perverse." The original meaning of "peevish" was simply "silly or foolish," but by about 1530 it had acquired the sense of "irritable, ill-tempered or fretful." Surprisingly, it then took several hundred years to develop "peeve" as the word for the irritating agent or action. "Pet peeve," meaning the one thing that annoys you more than anything else, first appeared around 1919. The "pet" (in the sense of "favorite") formulation probably owes its popularity and longevity to its mild perversity ("favorite annoyance" is a bit oxymoronic) as well as its snappy alliteration."
I'm generally pretty patient with people...but there are a few things I just can't stand!
-prejudice
-apathetic ignorance
-incompetence
-people who snoop incessantly (though friends are usually ok)
-vulgarity
-fake laughter
-disloyalty
That's all I can think of for now...anything that gets on *your* nerves?
Fare thee well!
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