Grumpy Old Dan Smith

Yelling is our built-in public address system and it’s usually reserved for sounding an alarm: Like yelling at someone to get out of the way before a Prius silently mauls them. Yelling for safety is a good thing. But yelling just to be heard? Have you ever taken the advice of someone who yelled it at you? No. Did the guy who just cut you off in traffic change his ways because you yelled at him. No. He didn’t even hear it. So why would people in what would seem […]

Without mentioning their names, you know who these people are. They are the folks who keep popping up in our culture and continue to annoy most of us. The politician who is desperately trying to stay in power by blaming space aliens for setting forest fires. The rap star turned antisemite film critic. Those women with large breasts who spend their time showing off their large breasts—not that there’s anything wrong with that. My question for these folks is why. How much money and attention do you need? Relax. Sit […]

This is self-appointed editorial director Dan Smith and here’s what makes me grumpy: Passwords. Be honest: how many times do you hit the “forget your password” link.  I’m a frequent forgetter. Each time I forget I promise myself that I will write the new password down and file it somewhere and each time I lose the piece of paper with the new password and I’m back to “forget your password?” These password people must be busy. The day will come when passwords will go the way of video tape, land […]

This is WLHA’s self-appointed, editorial director Grumpy Old Dan Smith and here’s what makes me grumpy: Our never-ending election cycle. It seems that during the last election, the next one started before the closing credits. Really? Maybe these people who announce their intentions early just need something to do. Anything. I have a to-do list of household projects that I would have to live to be 185 years old to accomplish. Until I make a dent in that list I’m not running for elective office. Here’s an idea. Let’s have […]

What’s the metaverse? As far as I can tell it’s a made-up word that pretty much means whatever you want it to mean. No one really knows what the metaverse is but that doesn’t stop budding entrepreneurs from trying to make money on it. Maybe you’re seen people wear those virtual reality headsets so they can pretend they’re dating Scarlett Johansson. Someone probably is dating Scarlett but it’s certainly not a guy in the metaverse. We live in the universe complete with water, land, global warming, Covid, and stupid people […]

We used to see yard signs pop up at election time like mushrooms on a dewy lawn but now we see them all the time anytime of year. Has your mind ever been changed by a yard sign? I’m guessing no. Sure you slow down because the sign says children are playing. You may even attend a neighborhood picnic or some other civic event. Fortunately, there are yard sign creators that make you chuckle. Here are some I swear on my Google password are true. “Grandpa finally died yard sale.” […]

This is WLHA’s self-appointed editorial director Grumpy Old Dan Smith and here’s what makes me grumpy. Billionaires in space. Will someone explain to me why a couple of guys with more disposable income than the GDP of the European Union need to spend ten minutes in space? These guys really believe there’s a market for space tourism. Have you seen any pictures of Mars? Not a single Tiki bar or water slide. The temperature averages a rather chilly minus 80 degrees and can dip down to minus 195 degrees in […]

Remember the good old days when you went into a store with a pocket full of bit coins and bought something? Pretty simple…here’s my money, give me my stuff and maybe I’ll see you soon. Today you don’t just buy stuff, you subscribe to it. We subscribe to the stuff we watch on TV, maybe a newspaper or a magazine or a particular service like lawn care. But now the subscription model is showing up in unlikely places. In the past week I received offers from a pain patch company […]

Sex A study found that the pandemic caused a decrease in our sexual desire, pleasure, and frequency. It makes sense, sort of. Let’s look a bit deeper. Right before the pandemic nearly a quarter of Americans said they had no sex at all in the past year. None. Even young people, who owe it to their species to get busy, are more and more likely to be sexually inactive. Scholars, and you know who you are, suggest many reasons for this decline: poisons in the environment, depression, and drug use. […]

Here’s what make me grumpy: emails—or more precisely emails that sound like your mother yelling at you. Since we can’t raise our voice in print, we are tempted to use things like italics, bold print, underlining and my favorite: multiple exclamation points to underscore what we’re trying to communicate. Here’s what this styling says to me: You must think I’m stupid and unless you put it in all caps, italicized and bolded I have better chance being the next Space X pilot than understanding your email. Do we really need […]

Refrigerators Here’s what makes me grumpy: my refrigerator. It’s not so much the machine itself…it’s the relationship. We see each other frequently as I punch yet another hole in my belt. I understand why we need these things—hauling ice from the river wasn’t working out.  Any cultural anthropologist can tell you a lot about yourself just by looking in your Fridge. Are you organized, where every vegetable has a place? Or are you a train wreck like me where every item is on its own—eggs balanced on left over chicken […]

Daylight Savings Time No one really believes you can save daylight and if you could what are saving daylight for? Bug hunting? That’s why a guy from New Zealand proposed a two-hour time shift back in 1895. He wanted more time after work to pursue his passion after work. Did the bugs notice the time change. I sort of doubt it. Twice a year my world gets upset when we mess with our clocks. I’m not alone. Daylight saving time has been linked to heart attacks, strokes, car accidents, and […]

Streaming This is WLHA’s self-appointed editorial director Grumpy Old Dan Smith and here’s what makes me grumpy: Streaming. Streaming technology started when some smart people discovered a way to send stuff between two places without wires. It became what we call radio, then television, then streaming text and today streaming delivers tv shows, movies, music, games and, yes, radio like WLHA the Big 64. People cut their cables, took down their satellite dishes and today subscribe to places like YouTube, Netflix, Pandora, Hulu, Spotify anything else that’s been invented in […]

How that planet still has kings and queens and princes and princesses, dukes and duchesses, sultans and emperors in the 21st century is lost on this plebian. There are 44 countries that still claim royalty but only a handful that have any real ruling power. None the less, we just seem to love our royals. We seem to love them more the more they misbehave. I know this because I watch the Crown. Here in America, we call our royalty celebrities. We don’t need a king. We have The Weekend. […]

I’m self-appointed WLHA editorial director Grumpy Old Dan Smith and here’s what makes me grumpy: To do Lists. To do lists may work for others but they just make me depressed. Maybe I should call mine Things I-probably-should-have-done-but didn’t list. I just found an old to do list and as I look at it, I’m depressed that I didn’t do one thing on the list: I didn’t lose weight. I didn’t go to the gym. And I didn’t read War and Peace. I didn’t even go to the bookstore to […]

I’m self-appointed WLHA editorial director Grumpy Old Dan Smith and here’s what makes me grumpy: Happiness. What if I told you that being grumpy help you make more money, have a healthy marriage and live longer? Believe me. A lot of people way smarter than I am study this stuff: the stuff about happy versus grumpy people. I feel pressure to be happy from everyone from my mother to my radio. While happy may seem like a good thing many studies indicate that you’re better off being grumpy. Some studies […]

Unfortunately, the snow thrower started and so I had to be a good neighbor and throw the snow on the sidewalk onto the lawn. With more snow in the forecast maybe I’ll figure out which way to point this beast.

Holiday Specials This season Hallmark will present at least twenty Christmas movies with titles ranging from Christmas She Wrote to Never Kiss a Man in a Christmas Sweater—let’s face it, it’s tough coming up with original Christmas movie titles. And how about the rejected titles: Christmas in Solitary Confinement;  Rudolph the Red Nosed Uncle; Bells are Ringing in my Head.  Sure, these titles were rejected but at the pace of twenty movies per Christmas, we figure Hallmark will get around to most of them sooner than Santa can hitch up […]

I’m self-appointed WLHA editorial director Grumpy Old Dan Smith and here’s what make me grumpy: cheerful people. That’s right, cheerful people. If you’re one of these cheerful people I want to thank you for offering a bit of light in dark times. But what about those of us who like dark times? Can’t we wallow in the mud of negativity? Can’t we shoot whatever good idea you may have with our arrows of doom? If cheerful people had their way there would be no news media, no sad songs or […]

TV weather people. This comes from fellow Grump Doug Moe. As Doug put it: When did weather people decide they needed to be life coaches. We couldn’t agree more. Time was when weather people on TV just told you what the weather was, what it is and what’s it going to be. Enter media consultants and today, we not only get the temperature, humidity and forecast, we get a checklist: Bring your sunglasses, grab that raincoat, plenty of sunscreen, lots of water, don’t stare at the sun, check that survival […]