Mr. Cranky Pants!

Auntie likes to be taken seriously, but not too seriously. Case in point: Mr. Cranky Pants, who hangs out at the coffee shop across the street from SN&R—or Auntie should say, where SN&R used to be, since by the time you’ll be reading this, we’ll be in our new futuristic digs on Del Paso Boulevard. Anyway, Cranky has a tendency to go off every now and then, and he generally finds the biggest dude around to go off on. A couple of months ago, he attacked this burly biker riding a Harley with open pipes louder than a Slayer concert. The guy parked his bike, and the angry old coot got right in his face, screaming obscenities and threats. There’s gonna be trouble, Auntie thought. The biker somehow managed not to pile-drive Grandpa into the pavement. After 10 minutes of being viciously harangued, he fired up the engine and roared loudly away, another happy customer.

Here comes the part about being taken too seriously. A couple of weeks ago, Auntie wrote that the city should ban gas-powered leaf blowers, because they make too much noise and pollution. Well, apparently Mr. Cranky Pants read the column, because the other morning, he struck again. A nice, handsome and dare I say tall, young man was blowing leaves off the ice-skating rink that’s been built just below Auntie’s window. He was actually using one of the new, quieter blowers, so the racket wasn’t too bad as he skated around the rink. When he got to the far side of the rink—Auntie swears this is true—Mr. Cranky Pants suddenly grabbed Handsome by the sleeve and yanked him aside. “Use a fucking rake!” he screamed, over and over and over again. “Use a fucking rake!”

Auntie thanks the ice-rink employee for not jamming the leaf blower up old Cranky’s arse. In fact, Auntie wishes to thank all the ice-rink employees who’ve been toiling outside her window for the past couple months, especially the fellow with the longest plumber’s crack your Ruthness has ever measured. Seriously, Auntie complained about the Christmas music when the rink first opened, but they switched to classic rock after three days. Aerosmith’s “Dude (Looks Like a Lady)” was in high rotation. You couldn’t pick a better tune for this particular slice of Midtown. Ruth will miss it after SN&R moves, even old Mr. Cranky Pants.