Fitching

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Fitching

v. intr.
compulsively turning away from works of art you find frustratingly, nauseatingly good—wanting to shut off the film and leave the theater, or devour a book only in maddening little chunks—because it resonates at precisely the right frequency to rattle you to your core, which makes it mildly uncomfortable to be yourself.

From bitching, markedly good + fitch, the European polecat, an animal that often cripples its prey by piercing its brain with its teeth, before storing it alive in its burrow to return and eat sometime later.

Pax Latrina

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Nighthawk

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Los Vidados

Cover image for the Los Vidados word card on the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

Insoucism

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Achenia

a close-up of a bottle with an organic object inside

Yeorie

a woman with tendrils of smoke moving across her face