My Dad never got cranky, and he lived to be 83. He never lost his basic demeanor, he might have a bad moment now and then, when he'd err on the side of honesty rather than being polite, but that was usually when he was very sick, and dealing with daft folks.
In general, i have found that old age tends to distill a person's basic personality in many cases - they become more extreme examples of what they always were.
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