Vexation is the feeling of being annoyed, frustrated, or irritated by something that keeps bothering you. It's that specific kind of frustration you get when something won't work the way it should, when someone keeps interrupting you, or when a problem keeps showing up again and again.

When you experience vexation, you're genuinely bothered and agitated, like when you're trying to concentrate on homework but your little brother keeps making noise, or when you've explained something three times and someone still doesn't understand.

You might feel vexation when a puzzle piece won't fit where you're sure it belongs, when your pencil lead keeps breaking, or when you forget your lunch on the same day there's pizza in the cafeteria. The word suggests ongoing annoyance rather than a brief flash of anger. A single interruption might be annoying, but repeated interruptions cause vexation.

The related word vexing describes whatever causes this feeling: a vexing problem is one that frustrates you by being harder to solve than it should be. People also use the older-fashioned phrase “vexed question” to describe an issue that troubles people repeatedly without easy answers.