Leave a trail

Monday 5 November 2012

We have a properly awful chain of shops here in the UK called Iceland. They peddle frozen offal and blandly derivative cack - tikka pizzas, sweet-and-sour samosas and other types of schizophrenic franken-nosh.  To persuade people to actually buy this nonsense, there are ghastly advertisements featuring the national sweetheart putting out plate after platter of aneimic prawn rings and frozen balls of poo with chocolate on, gurning madly amid the madcap antics of unattractive and ill-behaved brats, all with the tagline 'Mum's Gone to Iceland.'

Which makes one of my favourite blogs all the funnier, because that mum really did go to Iceland and wrote a delightful account of the trip and several more European and further-flung destinations since then.

Reading Trish's blog is like having a long-awaited letter from a very witty old mate.  Her travels feature her long-suffering Doctor husband and teenage son, and she manages to combine both irreverence and appreciation for her destinations.  She's a Newcastle girl and one after my own heart; she makes me laugh out loud and is one of the few people I could ever imagine actually travelling with.  I know that she'd see all the quirky, ridiculous and fanny-shaped things first and point them out with glee.

She's also annoyingly well-informed about the places she goes to.

An unexpected treat is her second blog, where she writes up the memoirs of her beloved dad, up to and including his time as a Cambridge undergraduate in the 1950s.  These are a complete delight; his intelligence, humour and right-on politics, both as a student and while doing National Service, have clearly gone straight to his daughter.  Which gifts, combined with her mother's old-school North-East tell-it-how-it-is make both blogs such brilliant reads.

And not a frozen prawn ring in sight.


By+Invitation+Only+SMALL+ICON.pngI am blogging today for By Invitation Only - please visit this lovely fellow blogger to learn more and to see links to a group of fabulous international bloggers

11 comments:

  1. offofwoottoninnit5 November 2012 at 22:18

    I'm still stuck at "...and frozen balls of poo with chocolate on" ROFL!! I will read the rest, promise! x

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  2. Trish's blog sounds like a lot of fun...I'm going to pop across and visit ;-)
    And her second blog she writes sounds delightful...thank you for the introduction!
    Catherine
    xx

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  3. This is fun, can't wait to visit all the new blogs. Thanks for sharing.Have a great day. Mona

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  4. Hello lovie...what a perfect post you've given us today. Trish sounds like a girl all of us need to know..so I'm popping over right now. So happy you're with us, and one day I would love to see you fully attired atop that horse !!

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  5. Thank you for the new blogs.. I love finding new ones and Trish sounds like a fabulous read... Great to meet you too Elizabeth... xv

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  6. Welcome to our group, Elizabeth. Lovely to meet you!
    And thank you for this interesting post, will certainly read Trish's blog which sounds highly interesting!
    Warm greetings from France,
    karin

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  7. Welcome to our group!! Loved my visit here and Trish;s post as well!
    VEronica
    Tassels Twigs and Tastebuds

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  8. Hello Elizabeth! *me, waving from Provence* Oh, you made me laugh from your first sentence alone! Let alone your profile. Hooray!
    Thanks for the suggestion and welcome to the group,
    Heather at Lost in Arles

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  9. You are so funny and witty yourself! Welcome to our group! Thanks for pointing us to Trish's blog! She sounds so interesting!

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  10. Hi Elizabeth,
    It's so nice to meet you and welcome to the group!
    Thank you for sharing Trish with us today, I'm on my way there soon.
    I love your intro, Iceland really need to thank you for you sharing them with us as well! Even if their stuff is schizophrenic franken-nosh, (love it!!).

    Sending hugs from down under Australia,
    xx Coty

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  11. Thank you for highlighting my two blogs; I'm so thrilled you enjoy reading them.

    Next time I go on holiday I think I'll leave the Doc at home and take you instead, Elizabeth, so we can snort and point at rude sculptures together.

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Please leave a comment if you can be remotely bothered - anything you have to say is valuable and I absolutely love hearing from you all. Elizabeth