irk
/əːk
/verb [with object]
Irritate; annoy: it irks her to think of the runaround she received...
- It's the third essay which is particularly irking me, and which has provoked this writing.
- It is a significant Scottish story, yet it irks Miller that the London financial media display scant interest in its continued success, simply because it is a private firm.
- What irked me originally, and irks me now, is that two newspapers (at least) should have printed what was clearly an overly rosy version of the facts.
Synonyms
irritate, annoy, vex, gall, rattle, pique, rub up the wrong way, exasperate, try someone's patience, put out, displease;
anger, infuriate, madden, incense, make someone's blood boil, get on someone's nerves, make angry, make cross;
ruffle, ruffle someone's feathers, make someone's hackles rise, raise someone's hackles, discountenance;
antagonize, provoke, goad
informal get someone's goat, get/put someone's back up, peeve, miff, rile, aggravate, nettle, needle, get, get to, bug, hack off, get under someone's skin, get up someone's nose, put someone's nose out of joint, give someone the hump, rattle someone's cage, get someone's dander up, drive mad/crazy, drive round the twist, drive up the wall, make someone see red
British informal wind up, brown off, cheese off, nark, get across, get on someone's wick
North American informal tee off, tick off, burn up, rankle, ride, gravel, bum out
New Zealand informal rark
vulgar slang piss off
British vulgar slang get on someone's tits
informal, dated give someone the pip
Origin
Middle English (in the sense 'be annoyed or disgusted'): perhaps from Old Norse yrkja 'to work'.
Work irks many people, and may be related to irk, which possibly derives from Old Norse yrkja ‘to work, take effect upon’. Its earliest sense in English was ‘to be annoyed or disgusted’.