Commentary by Dick Wolfsie

“Hey, there’s that grumpy old man,” said a lady at the grocery store. “’You talkin’ to me?’” I snapped back (Mafia-style), which ruined any denial I was planning to offer.

I went back over all my weekly columns since 2001 to see if I could find any evidence of her claim. I only found about 324 examples. However, that’s over 15 years, so I think that puts me in the “easygoing kind of guy” category.

Here are some of the things I’ve complained about over the years…

Cereal boxes: I can buy 50 zip-lock bags for a couple of bucks, but the skinflints at General Mills can’t find a lousy two cents to put Wheaties into a zippable plastic pouch inside their cardboard boxes. Many think the current packaging is fine. And that’s not even counting 100 billon tiny black ants.

Phone extensions: I call people in their office at a small company and their phone extension is like 78456. Seriously. How about 6? Six would be a good extension. And by the way, I live on a street with four houses, and my number is 8210. And while I’m in a grumpy mood about numbers, I don’t like having to put in the area code to call my neighborhood across the street.

Here’s what I don’t want people to say to me when I’m out …

“Would you like a bag for that?” Clerks ask me that all the time. That’s fine when you have several small items. But the other day I bought a small package of M&M’S. “Would you like a bag for that?”  “NO, THEY ARE ALREADY IN A LITTLE BAG.” (I’m yelling again, aren’t I?).

“Have you dined with us before?” Why do waiters ask that question? How could that make a difference? No, we’ve never been here before. I see food items listed on this big piece of paper with prices next to each one. Now what do we do?

“Have any big plans this weekend?” Cashiers always ask me this on Thursdays and Fridays. I also don’t want them to ask if I had a nice weekend on a Monday or a Tuesday. This is why I only shop on Wednesdays.

So, do you think I’m grumpy? Hey, who asked you, anyway?