THEATER: Rude was on display

One of the things I have always loved about living in North Idaho from the moment we arrived is the general level of gentility we find here. People still hold doors for others, say please and thank you, give up waiting area seats in restaurants for older people, just plain nice. They will stop and check if you are broken down, help push you out of the street or call a tow truck for you. You know the kind of people I'm talking about.

Then there is the couple I ran into at the theater Friday night. I wasn't the only person who spoke to this man, who is one of the rudest people I've run into in more than 16 years here. He and his wife, by his own statement, had arrived at the theater an hour early, just to get the two seats in the back row of the theater. Now I understand wanting to sit back there, we do too, but there was an empty seat on each side of them, and he refused repeated requests to move one seat over, so another couple could sit down.

I hope they enjoyed the movie. I saw him later in the parking lot as we were leaving. He was a small man, a very small man.

KENT SETTY

Coeur d'Alene