Trouble with a friend

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I have a very close friend and we've been living together for a long time but I've become aware of a bad habit that they have. They will often be needlessly negative in situations where it is completely unnecessary. This isn't to say that I have a problem with them ever being negative, I don't have a problem with them expressing anger or frustration. I can even forgive lashing out at people when they're upset.

The issue comes when they snap or take a condescending or negative tone over something totally insignificant. Or they make negative a situation that had been emotionally-neutral or positive (if that makes sense).
Example: they are trying to find something, and instead of saying something along the lines of "Hey, do you think you could help me look for this?", it's "You know, you could help me look for it instead of just sitting there". (This is very common since they misplace things all the time).
Another: (Random) they mention that their lighter has a bottle opener on it, and I say that seemed odd to me (not like negative odd just something i was unfamiliar with being a thing), and instead of "Oh, they put those on lots of lighters because...", it's "Yeah they put those on lighters all the time I don't know how you don't notice this".

I would just call them out on this but these are such minor incidents that I feel like I'll just get brushed off for making a big deal about something that doesn't matter. It's just so consistent that it builds up and makes me miserable and anxious just being around them. It doesn't help that they have a bad history of not owning up to bad behavior in general. Not to mention that it happens so frequently I would feel like I'd be calling them out on a daily or hourly basis a lot of the time and I don't want to be like that.

Any advice on how to handle this?

It will be kind of hard to do this since you live with the person, but start avoiding them. They will eventually notice. I forget where I read this, but everything we needed to know we learned in kindergarten.

If you watch small children, they give most everyone a fair shake initially. Then, the longer they hang around with them they begin to notice what they don't like. And they remove themselves. The ostracized kid will either learn to behave in a socially acceptable way or they won't. It's their choice.

The good thing about this situation is that you're both adults. If your roommate cares about you at all, they will come to you and say, "why the change in your reaction to me?" If they don't, you'll know they don't care. Either way, this will not be a comfortable situation for a little while. I guess you need to decide if you want to waste your energy, if you still want to live there, etc...?

This won't really work for any number of reasons. They've already noticed that I tend to avoid initiating conversation with them. Although I've been doing that for a long while even before I realized I didn't deserve to be treated like this because I have terrible anxiety. But instead of considering that that might be why I'm avoidant, they assume I'm being passive aggressive. This is a common accusation they throw around at people who aren't 100% direct with them 100% of the time about airing grievances or calling them out for things. In reality, people avoid calling them out for things or being direct in general because this person is already inclined to suddenly become irritable and defensive, and is, by their own admission, incredibly stubborn.
So people don't call this person out for things until it blows up because people can't hold it in anymore. And when that happens, this person avoids taking responsibility, and convinces themself they are the victim of people being facetious or passive aggressive or disrespectful somehow. (I was particularly irritated recently when they suggested my not calling them out for things was because I didn't respect them and not because I have terrible anxiety that they claim to know I have). And on top of this, one of our other housemates whose toes this person often steps on has even worse anxiety than me, so them calling this person out is even less likely than me doing it and it blows up twice as bad when it does.