The Collaborative International Dictionary
Fastidious \Fas*tid"i*ous\,
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[L. fastidiosus disdainful, fr. fastidium loathing, aversion, perh. fr. fastus arrogance (of uncertain origin) + taedium loathing. Cf. Tedious, Fash.] Difficult to please; delicate to a fault; suited with difficulty; squeamish; as, a fastidious mind or ear; a fastidious appetite.
Proud youth ! fastidious of the lower world.
--Young.Syn: Squeamish; critical; overnice; difficult; punctilious.
Usage: Fastidious, Squeamish. We call a person fastidious when his taste or feelings are offended by trifling defects or errors; we call him squeamish when he is excessively nice or critical on minor points, and also when he is overscrupulous as to questions of duty. ``Whoever examines his own imperfections will cease to be fastidious; whoever restrains his caprice and scrupulosity will cease to be squeamish.''
--Crab -- Fas*tid"i*ous*ly, adv. -- Fas*tid"i*ous*ness, n.
Wiktionary
adv. In a fastidious manner
WordNet
adv. in a fastidious and painstaking manner; "it is almost a waste of time painstakingly to learn the routines of selling" [syn: painstakingly]
in a fastidious manner; "he writes extremely musical music, of which the sound is fastidiously calculated and yet agreeably spontaneous and imaginative"
Usage examples of "fastidiously".
Lord Valenthyne Farfalla, looking as fastidiously proper as ever, dismounted and bowed low before his general.
After experimental particle physicists fastidiously measure these data, theorists can then use the standard model to make testable predictions, such as what should happen when particular particles are slammed together in an accelerator.
Jamie, panting, dumped her unceremoniously on one of the narrow beds, then wiped his sweating brow on his coat sleeve, and, long nose wrinkled, began fastidiously to dust manure crumbs from the skirts of his coat.
Think of people FARMING on a slant which is so steep that the best you can say of it--if you want to be fastidiously accurate--is, that it is a little steeper than a ladder and not quite so steep as a mansard roof.
She was outside the splatter pattern, and she dropped the pulser on the desk, straightened her jacket fastidiously, and let herself out of the office.
She wiped her hands fastidiously, poured water from her flask to wash her face, turned that face to me at last, quiet, unsmiling, unfrowning, quiet.
Concentrating on unwriting, the secretary disgorged fried oysters fastidiously into her left hand bite by bite, then wiped tartar sauce off each oyster into a paper cup.
The next morning, a plump Emirates financier, in his white gown, vest, kufi cap, and fastidiously trimmed beard, left his palatial home in Dubai to travel downtown for his meeting with the FBI.
Dolly watched the way he picked up his cup and sipped his coffee fastidiously.
Slightly nauseated by such a blatant display, Lunzie fastidiously took a few slices of some yellowish fruit, more crackers, and moved away.
The old eunuch now brought out a little package, opened it, fastidiously scooped a tiny quantity of its contents on to the nail of his little finger, and tipped it into his wine.
Carpenter fastidiously adjusted the right-hand seat's back rest until it was exactly right for him, manoeuvred his parachute to its position of maximum comfort, fastened his seat-belt, unhooked and adjusted on his head a combined earphones and microphone set and made a switch.