Holding my breath

I get instantly nervous anytime I hear a word that starts with the sound "nig".

First and foremost, I am always concerned that it will be That Word, which I have only had the misfortune to hear twice in my life.

But secondly, in situations when it is not That Word, I am concerned that someone will assume it is a word related to That Word and take the same umbrage I would have had it been That Word.

So you can imagine how I tensed up today at the oldest's practice when I overheard one man, speaking to another, refer to his boss as "nothing but a damn niggler". I don't think I breathed for a full ten seconds.

niggler
noun
A person who finds fault, often severely and willfully: carper, caviler, critic, criticizer, faultfinder, hypercritic, nitpicker, quibbler.
"niggler." Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition. Houghton Mifflin Company, 1995. Answers.com 02 Nov. 2005. http://www.answers.com/topic/niggler