When the carnival comes to town

Why is it that the most miserable looking, grumpiest and most apothetic people at any carnival seem to be the carnival ride operators?
They are surrounded by all this energy, the lights the movement, the colour, laughing children and happy parent overjoyed to see the excitement on their childs face, but when stung by the sourness of some of those operators it is enough to make you purse your lips and do the squinty eye thing.
Alex wanted to go on this ride that had helicopters and planes that went around, he would have had to go by himself and was all keen on it from the minute he saw it. So after doing the rounds to see what the choices were before blowing our very limited dough, we went back to it. "Alex would like to take a ride", I said offering my ride ticket to the ride operator. "ride's closed", he barked abruptly and unapologetically. "A friggin sign might be useful, you B......", I thought but did not say. Later the ride was operating and so we went back to it. This time the operator snatched the ticket from my hand, but Alex changed his mind. He didn't want to go on it, probably because the guy was so gruff. So I said to the guy, "I paid for a ticket, but Alex has changed his mind about going on this ride now". "Whatever", he said and walked off! Surprised I looked at this lady who gave me the "is he serious" look. So she bails up this guy and restates my case, but he just said "not my problem" and turned his back. If this is this guy attitude in the carnivals first couple of hours, imagine what he is going to be like by the end of day three - lighten up sour puss.