Dear Cheese Lady,

I do not know why you are so cranky. The other day you practically bit off Foodgoat's head for misinterpreting a request for Parmesan cheese as a request for you to cut another slice off the block of Parmigiano-Reggiano. We took the pre-cut slice and ran, ran until we were sure towering demon, aflame with hate, was not bearing down upon us.

Had that been an isolated event, we would understand. Everyone has a bad day. Maybe a rogue had ganked you one too many times. Maybe you too saw Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and its horrendous (though not nearly as nauseating as the ending of Breakfast as Tiffany's) Hollywood ending on TCM. Or perhaps a human foot fell out of sky into your backyard, as it did to my mother's co-worker. Things happen.

But you are always cranky. Every week we buy cheese; every week we quail under your angry glare.

You are the polar opposite of the Bacon Lady, who always jokes around with us, and the Old Vegetable Man, who pretends to charge us $400 for asparagus every week.

Can it be that you do not enjoy your job? Could it possibly be (I shudder to consider it!), that you do not like cheese, one of the great accomplishments of human civilization?

Because if I worked at a cheese stand, if I could try cheeses all the time, if I could share with people my favorite cheddars, bleus, and fetas, and get paid for it ... good Lord, woman, I'd be the freakin' gladdest Pollyanna on the block.

From now on, we will hide until we see you with another poor customer, at which point we will buy the cheese from the Cheese Punk Kids (we've seen them smile) or the Cheese Owner-Guy (who happily talks cheese to us).