pick at

Definitions

1. 1

   To touch, grab, handle, or pull tentatively or gingerly, using a utensil or one's fingers.

   • Mr Vholes remained immovable, except that he secretly picked at one of the red pimples on his yellow face with his black glove.
   • He began to pick at the fussy fringe on the arm of his chair.
2. 2

   To pick on or repeatedly criticize (someone).

   • "[N]oise and disrespect of no kind ain't pleasin' to him. His own folks behave becomin', but strangers go and act as they like. . . . Then we are picked at for their doin's."
   • "And I know she's my aunt, but she needn't pick at me all the time," she added defiantly.
   • "I get crabby and pick at him about stupid things that wouldn’t normally bother me."

The neighborhood