Addressed freezing indefinitely when requests are aborted.

config/default.js

@@ -60,6 +60,13 @@ module.exports = {
         avoidDuplicates: true,
         retries: 3,
         concurrency: 10,
+        // wall-clock ceiling (ms) for a single item-download attempt (src/fetch/item.js).
+        // bhttp has no timeout of its own - a request that connects but then just stops
+        // responding (a stalled/misbehaving proxy tunnel is a common cause) would otherwise
+        // hang forever, and since the limiter's concurrency is capped, that one stuck request
+        // blocks every other download queued behind it indefinitely. This bounds each attempt
+        // so a stall fails (and retries, per `retries` above) instead of hanging forever.
+        timeout: 60000,
         watch: {
             schedule: '*/30 * * * *',
         },
@@ -102,6 +109,13 @@ module.exports = {
     proxy: {
         use: true,
         default: null,
+        // if a request fails (including timing out - see fetch.timeout above) and is about to
+        // be retried, retry it using whichever of proxied/direct is NOT what would normally
+        // apply for that host - e.g. the proxy itself is down or being blocked by the target
+        // site, or (the reverse) a host reachable directly is refusing unproxied traffic.
+        // Off by default: for a privacy-sensitive proxy (e.g. Tor) silently falling back to a
+        // direct connection on failure is very much not what you want.
+        retryFlipped: false,
         hosts: {
             // hostnames are matched by suffix, so e.g. 'reddit.com' also covers
             // 'www.reddit.com', but not 'v.redd.it' or 'redd.it' - those need their own