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Writer's pictureJace Shoemaker-Galloway

Happy Do a Grouch a Favor Day: Famous American grumps & cranky characters

While we can all be one from time-to-time, chances are pretty good you either know one, work with one and/or live with one. You know the type – prickly, stern, cranky, abrasive, with zero sense of humor and downright nasty to be around. Doom and gloom is their mantra! Yessir, they can make life just plain miserable for non-grouches!

But today is about turning the other cheek and doing something nice for those folks we avoid most - habitual grouches, grumps, scrooges and sourpusses everywhere. No matter how painful it may be to even consider, Feb. 16 is Do a Grouch a Favor Day! Just image doing something nice for your least favorite grump when he or she least’s expects it! Their expression could be priceless! While the origins of this “holiday” are unknown, the annual event occurs a few days after Valentine’s Day. Coincidence perhaps?

  • Children learn all about grumps from everyone's favorite green grump - Oscar the Grouch.

  • While she may be little rough around the edges, Maxine tells it like she sees it!

  • One is most certainly grumpy in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.

  • The Wizard of Oz has several less than cheery characters in this classic film, including Miss Gulch and/or the Wicked Witch of the West and the Wizard himself.

  • Ebenezer Scrooge is an old and bitter miser who changes his tune once a few ghosts show up.

  • James Stewart and Donna Reed star in this classic holiday film, It’s a Wonderful Life.

  • Whether you watch the original Odd Couple television series starring Tony Randall and Jack Klugman or the film versions starring Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau,sometimes opposites do not attract!

  • Ed Asner starred as a crotchety editor in both the Mary Tyler Moore Show and his own Lou Grant television series.

  • Real-life father and daughter duo, Henry and Jane Fonda, star in this Academy-award winning film that also stars the delightful Katharine Hepburn, On Golden Pond.

  • Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau play in two films about grumps - Grumpy and Grumpier Old Men.

  • Walter Matthau stars in the 1993 remake of Dennis the Menace.

  • Charles Grodin plays the grumpy dad in this fun animal flick, Beethoven.

  • Jim Carrey shines in How the Grinch Stole Christmas.

  • Meryl Streep and Anne Hathaway star in The Devil Wears Prada.

  • Jack Nicholson plays the crotchety grump in As Good As It Gets.

  • Clint Eastwood plays grump extraordinaire in Gran Torino.

  • And last, but hardly least, the famous feline grouch, Grumpy Cat!

Bah humbug! And don't forget - tomorrow is Celebrate Random Acts of Kindness Day: Pay it forward!

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