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petty
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petty as in:  a petty crime

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  • She has a record of petty theft.
  • Delegate petty matters to your staff and keep your focus on important things.
  • In the interest of a civil environment, Rosa Hubermann and Frau Holtzapfel were kept separated, though some things were above petty arguments.   (source)
    petty = insignificant
  • He confesses to many things, petty acts of vandalism and theft, that Connor couldn't care less about.   (source)
    petty = insignificant (unimportant)
  • Such details might have alarmed Mr. Eberhardt more than the petty acts of vandalism.   (source)
    petty = of less importance
  • Every petty tyrant-to-be would like to have the boy, to set him in front of an army and watch the world either flock to join or cower in fear.   (source)
    petty = insignificant (unimportant)
  • To-morrow, and to-morrow, and tomorrow,
    Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
    To the last syllable of recorded time;
    And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
    The way to dusty death.   (source)
    petty = of less importance
  • HALE: Proctor, I cannot think God be provoked so grandly by such a petty cause.   (source)
    petty = unimportant
  • I'm dying to tell you about another one of our clashes, but before I do I'd like to say this: I think it's odd that grown-ups quarrel so easily and so often and about such petty matters.   (source)
  • And to be quite honest, Mrs. Dando, the last thing Michael needs is to be troubled by petty things like football and school.   (source)
    petty = less important
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show 11 more with this conextual meaning
  • And even when they became discontented, as they sometimes did, their discontent led nowhere, because being without general ideas, they could only focus it on petty specific grievances.   (source)
    petty = insignificant (unimportant)
  • The encouragement Buck gave the rebels led them into all kinds of petty misdemeanors.   (source)
  • He's a petty thief, a nobody.   (source)
    petty = of less importance
  • ...to seek, resolutely, the true and indestructible value that lay hidden in the petty and wearisome incidents, and ordinary characters with which I was now conversant.   (source)
    petty = unimportant
  • If your wish is to become really a man of science and not merely a petty experimentalist, I should advise you to apply to every branch of natural philosophy, including mathematics.   (source)
  • These annoyances were petty, though, and Ender persuaded himself to accept them as another form of praise.   (source)
  • Individually, no member of the Party owns anything, except petty personal belongings.   (source)
    petty = insignificant (unimportant)
  • Heavy physical work, the care of home and children, petty quarrels with neighbours, films, football, beer, and above all, gambling, filled up the horizon of their minds.   (source)
  • These supplied material for petty activity to a mind that would otherwise have been eaten up with rust.   (source)
  • The founders of the greater part of the families which now compose the aristocracy of Salem might here be traced, from the petty and obscure beginnings of their traffic, at periods generally much posterior to the Revolution, upward to what their children look upon as long-established rank, Prior to the Revolution there is a dearth of records; the earlier documents and archives of the Custom-House having, probably, been carried off to Halifax, when all the king's officials accompanied…   (source)
    petty = unimportant
  • Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world
    Like a Colossus; and we petty men
    Walk under his huge legs and peep about
    To find ourselves dishonorable graves.   (source)
    petty = insignificant
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petty as in:  don't be petty

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  • Don't be petty.
    petty = unpleasantly focused on unimportant things
  • Petty would be saying, "New number, who dis?"   (source)
    petty = attempting to make someone suffer for an unimportant wrong
  • He didn't want to lose, but he didn't want to be petty, either.   (source)
    petty = focusing on unimportant things
  • I admit: I had always thought I was above this kind of typical teenage pettiness, but I felt a lump in my throat throughout lunch.   (source)
    pettiness = focusing on an unimportant flaws
  • I learned that he could be petty, such as when he'd take a bite of the qurma his wife placed before him, sigh, and push it away.   (source)
    petty = make a big deal of unimportant things
  • Anyone who's so petty and pedantic at the age of fifty-four was born that way and is never going to change.   (source)
    petty = focusing on unimportant things
  • Realize how petty you've become.   (source)
    petty = focusing on unimportant flaws
  • We can be petty little creatures with...   (source)
    petty = focusing on unimportant things
  • Meanwhile the warlocks scorned the Fair Folk for their inability to lie, their hidebound customs, and their penchant for pettily annoying mundanes by curdling their milk and stealing their cows.†   (source)
  • I don't miss that smug look that crosses his face. Petty.   (source)
    petty = unpleasantly focused on unimportant things
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show 9 more with this conextual meaning
  • All very petty.   (source)
    petty = focusing on unimportant things
  • I'm not being petty.   (source)
    petty = attempting to make someone suffer for an unimportant wrong
  • She's so petty.   (source)
  • Petty.   (source)
  • The bookkeeper's life was made up of innumerable little pettinesses.†   (source)
  • Love has its childishness, other passions have their pettinesses.†   (source)
  • They pounce on the idea, and distort it, and then work it out so pettily and unworthily.†   (source)
  • The smaller human elements were kept out of sight; the pettinesses that enter so largely into all earthly living and doing were disguised by the accident of lover and loved-one not being on visiting terms; and there was hardly awakened a thought in Boldwood that sorry household realities appertained to her, or that she, like all others, had moments of commonplace, when to be least plainly seen was to be most prettily remembered.†   (source)
  • I make them lie with me sometimes, for I am very tired of the ladies of the town, of their coquetries, of their jealousies, of their quarrels, of their humours, of their pettinesses, of their prides, of their follies, and of the sonnets which one must make, or have made, for them.†   (source)
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petty as in:  petty officer

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  • She is the chief petty officer responsible for the review.
  • Pete, now a navy chief petty officer stationed in San Diego, came home to see Louie off.†   (source)
  • Petty Officer Powell kept an immaculate desk—a calendar blotter, twin upright pen stands, a nearly full ashtray, a telephone.†   (source)
  • The trident literally stuck so deep into my chest that the leading petty officer had to pull it out of my skin.†   (source)
  • Usually you have a chief petty officer (E7), who's the senior enlisted guy, and an LPO, the lead petty officer.†   (source)
  • In the galley aft a petty officer was standing still, holding a warm loaf of bread and looking curiously at the bulkhead-mounted speaker.†   (source)
  • James, like his close buddy Shane, was another inordinately tough SEAL, a petty officer second class.†   (source)
  • Petty Officer Brown demonstrated great foresight by gathering needed medical supplies for the injured man.†   (source)
  • Somebody was always complaining about the food or my mother was having a fight with Micky Nash because she'd caught her with a petty officer in her room.†   (source)
  • He studied it for a minute, then thrust it under the gaze of Navy Petty Officer Felix de Weldon.†   (source)
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show 54 more with this conextual meaning
  • He stood there in his petty officer's uniform, tall and almost shockingly broad-shouldered and thin-hipped, his cap pushed slightly back, the sun lighting on the patch of reddish hair that showed.†   (source)
  • Petty Officer 1st Class Neil Roberts's Squad Automatic Weapon, or SAW, was also hung on the wall.†   (source)
  • It I have to bust a petty officer everytime one of them does something like that, pretty soon I won't have anything but privates.†   (source)
  • The starpom flipped the switches himself, reaching past the petty officer.†   (source)
  • "We do a lot of record keeping," Petty Officer Powell replied.†   (source)
  • And he ordered Lieutenant Ismay and our leading petty officer student, "Drop, and push 'em out.†   (source)
  • Petty Officer Monsoor's actions could not have been more selfless or clearly intentional.†   (source)
  • "This man here is Ishmael Chambers," Petty Officer Powell explained.†   (source)
  • The quartermaster, a starshina (petty officer), dialed the annunciator to the STOP position.†   (source)
  • Next we flew back across the country to visit the huge family of Petty Officer James Suh.†   (source)
  • Petty Officer Powell fell forward in his chair and carefully snubbed out his cigarette.†   (source)
  • Andre Katyskin, a cook petty officer from Leningrad.†   (source)
  • A petty officer pulled on the hydraulic control levers.†   (source)
  • Upon receiving enemy small arms fire from numerous alleys, Petty Officer Wasdin took up a firing position and returned fire.†   (source)
  • Petty Officer Michael Thornton of SEAL Team One threw the body on his shoulders in a fireman's carry to bring him home.†   (source)
  • A lot of times the chief leaves, the LPO—lead petty officer—becomes the chief, and then someone else becomes LPO.†   (source)
  • Petty Officer Wasdin, along with the security team, stopped to suppress enemy fire which had pinned down the Ranger blocking force.†   (source)
  • Right around this time, I was assigned a minder, Petty Officer First Class Jeff Delapenta (SEAL Team 10), who would never leave my side.†   (source)
  • Chief Petty Officer Kyle†   (source)
  • Ishmael Chambers, in the last light of day, found himself seated in the office of the lighthouse chief petty officer, a large man named Evan Powell.†   (source)
  • They decided that Shane should be replaced by Petty Officer Danny Dietz, a thirty-four-year-old I had known well for years.†   (source)
  • During this period, Petty Officer Wasdin consistently performed his demanding duties in an exemplary and highly professional manner.†   (source)
  • Petty Officer/Planner†   (source)
  • Petty Officer Wasdin's exceptional professional ability, initiative, and loyal devotion to duty reflect great credit upon himself and the United States Naval Service.†   (source)
  • Morgan thought it was a great idea, and he introduced me to a recruiting officer in a nearby town, Petty Officer First Class Beau Walsh.†   (source)
  • The directional propellers worked them carefully into place and a petty officer made certain that the mating skirt was securely fastened.†   (source)
  • I forget who the winner was, probably some hickory-tough farm boy petty officer, but he was a couple of minutes better than I was.†   (source)
  • Later, while attempting to suppress enemy fire, during an attempted link-up for evacuation of the helicopter crash site, Petty Officer Wasdin was wounded a third time.†   (source)
  • The petty officer saw it first.†   (source)
  • U.S. Navx photo bv Photographer's Mate 2nd Class Eric S. Logsdon Petty Officer Matthew Axelson in combat gear, ready to face the enemy.†   (source)
  • Petty Officer Wasdin was the member of a security team in support of an assault force that conducted an air assault raid into an enemy compound and successfully apprehended two key militia officials and twenty-two others.†   (source)
  • Behind him an ensign and a senior petty officer were monitoring instruments and preparing to deploy the manipulator arm, attached before they sailed, which carried a television camera and floodlights.†   (source)
  • By his superb initiative, courageous action, and complete dedication to duty, Petty Officer Wasdin reflected great credit upon himself and upheld the highest tradition of the United States Naval Force.†   (source)
  • I detached from SDVT I and joined SEAL Team 5, where I was appointed leading petty officer (LPO) to Alfa Platoon.†   (source)
  • Courtesy of Daniel J. Murphv, Esq. Petty Officer Danny Dietz provided our covering fire all afternoon.†   (source)
  • Photo by DCl Photography, Randx Adger Petty Officer First Class Jeff Taylor from Virginia Beach was another mighty Navy SEAL who answered our desperate call for help on the Hindu Kush.†   (source)
  • Our first classroom involved meeting our leading petty officer instructor, Chief Bob Nielsen, another Gulf War veteran of several overseas deployments.†   (source)
  • So while I'm on the subject I'll explain how a farm boy from the backwoods of East Texas came to be made a petty officer first class and a team leader in the U.S. Navy SEALs.†   (source)
  • We went to Arlington National Cemetery afterward to visit the graves of Lieutenant Mike McGreevy Jr. and Petty Officer First Class Jeff Lucas, of Corbett, Oregon.†   (source)
  • There was SGT2 Matthew Gene Axelson, not yet thirty, a petty officer from California, married to Cindy, devoted to her and to his parents, Cordell and Donna, and to his brother, Jeff.†   (source)
  • Inside, beyond the SEAL escort to the coffins, I saw a very hard combat veteran, Petty Officer Ben Saunders, one of Danny's closest friends, weeping uncontrollably.†   (source)
  • We were called into a briefing: Lieutenant Mike Murphy, Petty Officer Matthew Axelson, Petty Officer Shane Patton, and I. We listened to the data and the requirements and still regarded it as just another op. But at the last minute there was a big change.†   (source)
  • Courtesy of Suzanne Kristensen Chief Petty Officer Dan Healy, the iron man SEAL strategist who died with his team when the rescue helicopter was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade fired by the Taliban in the Afghan mountains.†   (source)
  • Somewhere up above us, swinging in his hammock, headset on, listening to rock-and-roll music, was Petty Officer Second Class Shane Patton, twenty-two-year-old surfer and skateboarder originally from Las Vegas, Nevada.†   (source)
  • Well, I hope they're proud of themselves, because they nearly broke my mom's heart, and if it had not been for the stern authority of Senior Chief Petty Officer Chris Gothro, I think she might have had a nervous breakdown.†   (source)
  • Petty Officer Brown's professionalism and devotion to duty reflected great credit upon himself and were in keeping with the highest traditions of the United States Naval Service.†   (source)
  • Those who passed would be "platooned up"—assigned to one of twelve platoons on Team FOUR, each comprising sixteen men: two officers, a chief petty officer, and thirteen enlisted.†   (source)
  • As the leading petty officer, he headed a twelve-man SEAL unit tasked with creating a premier maritime fighting force from the ranks of Colombia's marines.†   (source)
  • ON APRIL 3, 2002, KELLEY DROVE ADAM, now Petty Officer Second Class Brown, to the SEAL Team TWO compound at Little Creek to see him off on his first deployment.†   (source)
  • In one of Adam's earliest performance evaluations while in Golf Platoon, Harley wrote: Despite his limited experience, Petty Officer Brown's initiative and determination ensured 100 percent success in his [platoon's] department.†   (source)
  • To a petty officer who then advanced from the gate he said, "Thy comrade died like a soldier.†   (source)
  • At a signal passed down from the deck, and communicated to the hortator by a petty officer stationed on the stairs, all at once the oars stopped.†   (source)
  • Costello, a chief petty officer, never passed a weekend without having several officers' wives beg him to slake his appetite for flesh in delightfully squalid hotels.†   (source)
  • Could great men thunder As Jove himself does, Jove would ne'er be quiet, For every pelting petty officer Would use his heaven for thunder: nothing but thunder.†   (source)
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  • These people were something Germanic and sectarian, crossbred with seventh-generation Puritans — an industrious but fervent mix that produced, in addition to the usual collection of virtuous, lumpen farmers, three circuit riders, two inept land speculators, and one petty embezzler — chancers with a visionary streak and one eye on the horizon.†   (source)
  • Maybe he wasn't with Genevieve and now I've just done a very petty thing out of spite.†   (source)
  • We knew all the neighbors, everyone looked out for everyone else's kids, and there was basically no crime other than petty theft.†   (source)
  • But if every man has his strengths, one of the Bishop's was that he was never more than a step away from petty protocol and an inherent sense of superiority.†   (source)
  • Gita has enough issues dealing with petty jealousies over her job in the administration building, her friendship with the seemingly protected Cilka, and, of course, visits from her boyfriend, the Tatowierer.†   (source)
  • It was like a jolt that stopped us in our tracks and forced us to look up from the pettiness of our daily lives.†   (source)
  • You could see it in the people in the neighborhood, intimidated by the drug dealers and gangs, harassed by the petty crime of the crackheads, and frightened by the sometimes arbitrary and aggressive behavior of the cops themselves.†   (source)
  • The random stops, questioning, and harassment dramatically increase the risk of arrest for petty crimes.†   (source)
  • I had been off on Friday—in part because the Traynors insisted I was owed a day off, but mostly because there was no way I could get a passport other than by heading to London on the train and queuing up at Petty France.†   (source)
  • But it is petty to complain, for God-for reasons that I do not understand-has still blessed me with far more than most people.†   (source)
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show 190 more examples with any meaning
  • Looks like he got kicked out of university for rewiring phone jacks to get free service...later did some petty theft.†   (source)
  • Hagrid, however, considers himself to be above such petty restrictions.†   (source)
  • If one grave in a graveyard looks like a target for petty vandals, that is the ghoul-gate.†   (source)
  • Orange indicates a low-level criminal—a guy convicted of petty thefts, drug possession, nonviolent and largely victimless crimes.†   (source)
  • Next to this, the party stuff seemed petty.†   (source)
  • They didn't have time to dwell on petty arguments.†   (source)
  • Professorji was a good man, by his lights, but he didn't seem the same caring teacher who, in sleek blue American aerograms only months before, had tempted Prakash, his best engineering student, to leave the petty, luckless world of Jullundhar.†   (source)
  • But everbody saying the judge wife be good friends with Miss Holbrook and how a regular sentence be six months for petty stealing, but Miss Holbrook, she get it pushed up to four years.†   (source)
  • No, she was tired of being a minor lady, waiting to be married off to the highest bidder, tired of petty politics and easily manipulated fools.†   (source)
  • You can get sick of anything if you have too much of it, like all the petty luxuries my mother bought and quickly grew bored with.†   (source)
  • At that crab dinner, I was so mad about what she said about my hair that I wanted to embarrass her, to reveal in front of everybody how petty she was.†   (source)
  • A long line of cars trailed behind me, and I felt anxious about holding them up; I marveled at how I could still have room to worry about such petty, ridiculous crap as whether the guy in the SUV behind me thought I was an excessively cautious driver.†   (source)
  • I'm not a murderer, you know, just a petty criminal.'†   (source)
  • I knew the last question sounded petty, but it hadn't come from spite.†   (source)
  • And for all her infectious lightness of heart, I knew it was an extremely petty cavil that Kitsey never seemed very moved by anything.†   (source)
  • In a pinch, he reverts to his previous profession, petty theft.†   (source)
  • I'm petty enough to enjoy it because I think it makes him look stupid.†   (source)
  • We haven't seen a war since the border was closed, and there is hardly any crime, except for the occasional incident of vandalism or petty theft.†   (source)
  • Without pettiness.†   (source)
  • I'm sure I looked at her through our father's miserable eyes sometimes: just another petty woman resenting me.†   (source)
  • They are going to bring you their problems, no matter how petty, and demand that you solve them.†   (source)
  • My mind went back over some of Margaret's petty insults.†   (source)
  • Weren't you the one in front of me at the Tom Petty concert who wouldn't sit down?†   (source)
  • And none of your petty philosophy or I'll make you sorry you ever took a shining to that little game.†   (source)
  • We must not fall prey to petty divisions, but concentrate on our next point of attack—the OAS members when they come.†   (source)
  • Her husband was serving time in the county jail across the street for being drunk or some petty crime like that.†   (source)
  • They make a lot of mistakes: they're petty; envious, lustful, occasionally greedy as well as courageous, elegant, powerful, knowledgeable, profound.†   (source)
  • Had taken a petty satisfaction in the fact that even if she ordered me that moment to mend her sleeve, I would have no time to do it.†   (source)
  • Luckily, Link managed to sneak over to Earl Petty's house to watch MTV, or Who Shot Lincoln would never have become Jackson High's premier—and by premier, I mean only—rock band.†   (source)
  • He reiterated his insistence that in Chicago "simplicity and reserve will be practiced and petty effects and frippery avoided."†   (source)
  • Jack didn't think he was that petty.†   (source)
  • Not some petty thief who probably only stole because they were hungry.†   (source)
  • Did you think, simply because you could challenge that petty war god, that you could stand up to me?†   (source)
  • The board review process included all these chief petty officers and master chiefs sitting down and reviewing a package of my accomplishments.†   (source)
  • Life whirled about me a wind of petty concerns, as I've said.†   (source)
  • Well, maybe I'm not that petty.†   (source)
  • All around us, my friends and neighbors and petty enemies ate and laughed and swayed to the music, oblivious to the fact that they were about to face horror, danger, maybe death.†   (source)
  • The strength of his enlisted crew, unlike that of Western crews, resided much more in his eleven michmanyy (warrant officers) than in his glavnyy starshini (senior petty officers).†   (source)
  • I expect you to show complete respect for the instructor staff, the class officers, and the senior petty officers.†   (source)
  • Several had seen or heard of family members getting carted off by authorities—or worse—for the pettiest of offenses.†   (source)
  • Allen, Canty, and Ramseur also all had misdemeanor convictions, ranging from criminal mischief to petty larceny.†   (source)
  • That must have made him look petty.†   (source)
  • Shorter hours, fairer wages, four holidays a year with full pay, no more petty fines and charges for thread, for needles ...It's almost everything you've been asking for.†   (source)
  • Dina works as a dispatcher at the Spruce Harbor police station, and as far as Molly can see there isn't much to stress over—a few drunk drivers, the occasional black eye, petty thefts, accidents.†   (source)
  • College seemed like a petty concern at the moment.†   (source)
  • There was no fairness involved with this decision, only a petty sort of revenge.†   (source)
  • It was one of those situations, like the Olympics for the handicapped, that make all the restrictions seem petty.†   (source)
  • "Four wouldn't be that petty," Christina says, either to chastise Cara or to reassure me, I'm not sure.†   (source)
  • Reduced to mute contempt and acts of petty vengeance, Annie stole cigarettes from the witch's purse and smoked them behind dripping rhododendrons, greenly contemplating how unwise it was to love, for those you loved would only die and leave you.†   (source)
  • Teenage boys who work longer hours are much more likely to develop substance abuse problems and commit petty crimes.†   (source)
  • Two days later, Kelley joined Adam as he oversaw the side-by-side burials of Chief Petty Officers Nathan H. Hardy and Michael E. Koch, both twenty-nine years old, at Arlington National Cemetery.†   (source)
  • The Nutt have traditionally engaged in prostitution and petty crime, and theirs is the world of intergenerational prostitution, in which mothers sell sex and raise their daughters to do the same.†   (source)
  • Green bottle shards poked up from the mortar at the top of the wall to dissuade intruders—robbery and petty theft were rampant in Addis—though the sight of roses lapping over the wall softened this deterrent.†   (source)
  • But Ambiades was not going to move a step at the request of a worthless and insolent petty criminal.†   (source)
  • "Rebecca," says Luke at last, "if this is about what happened between us that day—if this is some kind of petty revenge—" I'm really going to explode now.†   (source)
  • A little petty thievery.†   (source)
  • I was so mad at Dexter for showing me the picture, and as I drove I wondered why I'd never seen this duplicitous, petty, evil side of him.†   (source)
  • I am the Terrible Trivium, demon of petty tasks and worthless jobs, ogre of wasted effort, and monster of habit.†   (source)
  • You say you hate the Clave, but you're the one who made them what they are now—petty and paranoid.†   (source)
  • Except for the father, Cholly, whose ugliness (the result of despair, dissipation, and violence directed toward petty things and weak people) was behavior, the rest of the family—Mrs.†   (source)
  • Yet Charlie Conroy with his petty ambitions does not stand entirely alone.†   (source)
  • Mr. McMurphy, the purpose of this meeting is therapy, group therapy, and I'm not certain these petty grievances—†   (source)
  • Stoker vilified vampyres, which has caused our kind endless petty troubles with humans?'†   (source)
  • She thought that after what she had been through during the invasion she would stop being petty and grow up, grow wise and strong, but she had overestimated herself.†   (source)
  • The United States of America has been Balkanized, has been divided into twenty petty nations so that it will never again be a threat to world peace.†   (source)
  • No more the rumble of Hrothgar's horsemen, riding at midnight, chain-mail jangling in the whistling wind, cloaks flying out like wimpling wings, to rescue petty tribute-givers.†   (source)
  • Petty crimes embarrass the community and many people wistfully wonder why Negroes don't rob more banks, embezzle more funds and employ graft in the unions.†   (source)
  • In general, the arrogance, the petty infighting, the dishonesty, the desire for self-promotion, the orthodoxy.†   (source)
  • They constituted the sort of criminals, petty and otherwise, who sucked the life out of urban areas.†   (source)
  • I wrote about Fireball Roberts, Richard Petty, Bobby Allison, Cale Yarborough, Buddy Baker, Junior Johnson.†   (source)
  • What a petty man he turned out to be, giving up responsibility for a pretty face.†   (source)
  • And now didn't she feel stupid and petty?†   (source)
  • Mustn't let them think we British ladies are so petty as to indulge in arguments on the streets.†   (source)
  • Max read many such stories concerning petty feuds, coveted heirlooms, and bloodstained jewels plucked warm, from an owner's hand.†   (source)
  • He was petty, refusing to give a prisoner her letters if she had not been present at mail call, and rigidly enforcing the TV hours, much to the displeasure of the insomniacs.†   (source)
  • Their lives were filled with petty concerns.†   (source)
  • He hung out with rough characters and from time to time fell into bad ways: petty crime, then some not so petty.†   (source)
  • These staid men have become emotional because of their extreme exhaustion and have cultivated opinions and petty jealousies that will define their relationships for years to come.†   (source)
  • But all those petty angel politics.†   (source)
  • Adams's pride in his brilliant son could not have been greater, as he let him know when at times John Quincy grew discouraged with the pettiness and hypocrisies of politics.†   (source)
  • Eight years before, when Eve had busted Mavis for petty theft, she'd looked great.†   (source)
  • You finally left this nonsense of petty terrorism.†   (source)
  • The local newspapers highlighted the arrests until they grew so commonplace they were no longer a novelty; then they dropped Ira's scrapes with the law into the police log, with the rest of the petty-crime news.†   (source)
  • As he examines my cuts, I think of a dozen questions I could ask him, none of which will make him think that I'm strong and capable instead of childish and petty.†   (source)
  • He's what Brother Jack calls a petty-petty individualist!†   (source)
  • Their host, a grizzled one-armed petty lord by the name of Harwood Stout, knew better than to refuse him, though by now his larders must be well nigh exhausted.†   (source)
  • I was beginning to realize that a black man did not have to accept the dozens of petty indignities directed at him each day.†   (source)
  • Celia has judged 193 cases since she was elected to the People's Court, from petty thievery and family disputes to more serious crimes of medical malpractice, arson, and counterrevolutionary activities.†   (source)
  • In another mile she would be able to distinguish the individual flavors of resentments, petty victories, rejections, and angry little skirmishes for dominance.†   (source)
  • There was a war going on and no time to be wasted with petty new-guy treatment.†   (source)
  • One of them, a real bullet-head, was magnetic, showing both incredible pettiness and a form of distorted grandeur.†   (source)
  • Maybe in my desire to protect Patsy, I had unintentionally smothered her until my pettiness drove her away.†   (source)
  • What do you think you're saying?" he asked in a tone of petty anger, which sounded almost benevolent by bringing them back into the realm of the normal, into the near-wholesomeness of nothing worse than a family quarrel.†   (source)
  • At their worst, politicians (like the rest of us) can be petty, venal, and self-centered.†   (source)
  • We can be petty little creatures with petty little wickednesses.†   (source)
  • We were too many people in a small household for one person to take up so much space with what she considered to be my pettiness.†   (source)
  • Excitable, stewing with passions and depressions and petty angers, a taker of every small advantage, a believer in striking hard and fast and first.†   (source)
  • That presupposed fifty rowers, when needed, plus petty officers, officers, and at least one guy to handle the big starboard-mounted steering oar.†   (source)
  • Their disputes with Kemp's people seemed petty indeed against the weight of the disaster that had befallen the towns.†   (source)
  • Like Janice, she is acutely aware of every mean act and unkindness and lie and betrayal of which she has ever been guilty, and she recognizes that she still has the capacity for selfishness, pettiness, and cruelty; she yearns to transcend her past even as she quakes at the fortitude required to do so.†   (source)
  • What crime there is has been just petty stuff.†   (source)
  • I remember my father as the funny one, he'd make them all laugh with an old Korean joke or his impressions of Americans who came into his store, doing their stiff nasal tone, their petty annoyances and complaints.†   (source)
  • MARTHA: ....A son who I have raised as best I can against ....vicious odds, against the corruption of weakness and petty revenges .... GEORGE: ....A son who is, deep in his gut, sorry to have been born ....(BOTH TOGETHER).†   (source)
  • Landers chalked it up to petty jealousy.†   (source)
  • Montesquieu says that "the confederate republic of Germany" has both "free cities and petty states, subject to different princes..."†   (source)
  • The dis—United States would fragment into several petty, squabbling autocracies, proving the contention of European monarchists and reactionaries that this harebrained experiment in democracy could not last.†   (source)
  • Great wars and petty cruelties, all the murderings of men, all the sins; but also all the goodness, all the beauty.†   (source)
  • The captain was, of course, and some of the petty officers.†   (source)
  • For at the beginning Faramir spoke only of the errand upon which he had been sent out ten days before, and he brought tidings of Ithilien and of movements of the Enemy and his allies; and he told of the fight on the road when the men of Harad and their great beast were overthrown: a captain reporting to his master such matters as had often been heard before, small things of border-war that now seemed useless and petty, shorn of their renown.†   (source)
  • A hoarse rasping whisper—querulous, poisoned with needless ill will—his retort was freighted with all the churlish indignation of petty power.†   (source)
  • He was always on the lookout for the big break, but he could spend weeks on things that were quite petty.†   (source)
  • He, who gambled away tens of thousands at one roll of the dice and laughed at it, became more strict and more petty in his business, occasionally dreaming at night about money!†   (source)
  • Generous and understanding by nature, she developed a new suspiciousness and a tendency to nurse petty grievances.†   (source)
  • His first impulse, when he saw the horse and rider ahead, was to honk, both in self-advertisement, warning and greeting, but he remembered in time the seriousness of the occasion and did not do so, reflecting, after it was too late, that Thomas might feel he was snubbed, as if he had passed him in the street without speaking, and he was angry with Thomas for possibly having any such feeling about such petty matters, at such a time.†   (source)
  • Rod said urgently, "Jack, remember what I said about petty jealousies?†   (source)
  • No petty issues, no political trivia, not even private affairs, were permitted to clutter up his intellect.†   (source)
  • He called visiting petty officials "sir"; and shouted at the natives under him; he was on the railway, working as a pumpman.†   (source)
  • I'm afraid it will sound stupid and petty and trivial.'†   (source)
  • He immediately discounted the thought; Oromis would never be so petty.†   (source)
  • They start putting their trust in the wrong things, petty things.†   (source)
  • I held Zephyros accountable, but my own petty greed had caused Hyacinthus's death.†   (source)
  • But he made her speechless, made her overwhelming instinct seem petty, confused.†   (source)
  • It seemed worse than petty to leave Jacob feeling guilty about what he'd said.†   (source)
  • She handed Earl Petty's mom a clipboard with a pen attached to it.†   (source)
  • I don't (didn't?) like cheaters: dishonest, disrespectful, petty, spoiled.†   (source)
  • She's a malicious, petty woman who doesn't like other people in general.†   (source)
  • He would be saccharin sweet with the guests, a petty tyrant when he was backstage with the help.†   (source)
  • Petty Officers James Suh and Shane Patton reached the helo first.†   (source)
  • But now, no one was willing to waste energy on a petty hate when so much work remained.†   (source)
  • A petty misconception over a petty technology.†   (source)
  • I think I might have heard that," Mae said, hearing herself, hearing how petty she sounded.†   (source)
  • "Petty tricks, Your Majesty," Cain said to Elena.†   (source)
  • I then apologized in excruciating detail about every vulgar, petty innuendo included in the song.†   (source)
  • But sibling relationships are often fraught with petty tortures.†   (source)
  • Butler and his four most senior petty officers were already tending to the nuclear tea kettle aft.†   (source)
  • Father, I couldn't put a man in jail for life over what was supposed to be a petty crime.†   (source)
  • The Ministry did not cut deals with petty criminals in my day, no sir, they did not!†   (source)
  • It would be petty to spoil it over this.†   (source)
  • But to say all this would sound petty to Art, and Fia and Dory would think she was being mean.†   (source)
  • To want more, to wish for yet more, he knew, would be petty.†   (source)
  • Mine was to be the small life, my ambitions the petty ones.†   (source)
  • Every night before our mission, one of the senior petty officers would say, "C'mon now, guys.†   (source)
  • Lena looked at me like I was Earl Petty in Algebra, the second time around.†   (source)
  • If you succeed in giving guilders to petty children such as this," I gestured to Ambrose.†   (source)
  • I could tell it was a plan because he was alone, and Earl Petty was almost never alone.†   (source)
  • But the daughter's was not a petty nature.†   (source)
  • Even our childhood rivalries and petty differences were no match for the spell of that music.†   (source)
  • Downtown hooligan, pusher, petty thief, and addict?†   (source)
  • She is petty and controlling, and I shan't let her ruin my friend's life.†   (source)
  • It would look petty if you don't pay a man who saved your life the appropriate respect.†   (source)
  • I know it may seem petty to you, all this info desk drama, I wrote.†   (source)
  • I would have never imagined that Jake could be so petty and just plain mean.†   (source)
  • Resisted because it would be petty and unprofessional.†   (source)
  • I knew I sounded petty and jealous, but there was no other way to handle this.†   (source)
  • Telling herself it was petty, that it should have been over, didn't seem to matter.†   (source)
  • He did not suffer petty lords ordering him about like some thrall.†   (source)
  • Miles suspected Otis was more than the petty criminal that the rest of his family was.†   (source)
  • She was too relieved, too grateful that I had not, for my own petty reasons, given her away.†   (source)
  • I couldn't believe that she had become so worked up over something so petty.†   (source)
  • Then I explained that I didn't like her because she was mean and petty and full of pretense.†   (source)
  • We've identified a known dealer and petty thief who was found dismembered in one trench.†   (source)
  • The men of Horn Hill do not bow and scrape to petty lords.†   (source)
  • Who would not prefer the use of force to the rebellions and revolutions that harm petty republics?†   (source)
  • Let's not quarrel about such a petty misunderstanding.†   (source)
  • Who says celestial beings can't be petty?†   (source)
  • He could be petty and vindictive and callous and unfair, brutal and unyielding.†   (source)
  • He is among the top of the Second Class Petty Officers.†   (source)
  • And then all the petty schoolgirls are right sorry they've teased her so.†   (source)
  • Mundanes, Downworlders, petty crooks .... "Thanks," Simon said.†   (source)
  • Then, on the last day, I opened up and went to telling them what a petty bunch of farts they were.†   (source)
  • It was a peevish thing to do, a petty sort of revenge, but remember who we are dealing with.†   (source)
  • Did you really think you could render me helpless with such a petty, transparent trick?†   (source)
  • Becky the shoplifting pothead, I thought, and then immediately told myself I was being petty.†   (source)
  • Then they would rest, spinning out the hot hours in petty conversation or sleep.†   (source)
  • Revenge sprang into her mind, nasty, petty revenge.†   (source)
  • He disliked the petty complaints about the prices, especially from the customers in Manhattan.†   (source)
  • So, you see, even these minor distinctions felt like petty theft.†   (source)
  • For the greed and ambitions of all the petty kings?†   (source)
  • Can't you rise above those petty materialistic definitions?†   (source)
  • The supplies moved out to the ships, all to the encouraging bellows of Viking petty officers.†   (source)
  • I told her about the car, not so petty, but she wanted to hear more.†   (source)
  • The heartlessness, the pettiness, the foolishness of the situation was the talk of the Camp.†   (source)
  • "I would never call you silly or petty," I say sternly.†   (source)
  • They ranked Adam Brown five out of thirty-two second class petty officers.†   (source)
  • She didn't like the way it sounded when he said it...so petty, so dirty.†   (source)
  • The Brackens were petty lords, renowned for breeding horses.†   (source)
  • No more petty worries of airheaded youths.†   (source)
  • Knowing how petty the old man could be, she had expected their rooms to be bleak and cheerless.†   (source)
  • She wasn't speaking to me-in the juvenile, petty sense of the phrase.†   (source)
  • I cannot decide which is worse—the envy or the small, petty way it makes me feel inside.†   (source)
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