Frankly My Dear, He Didn't Give A Damn....

Grumpy has a long history of dragging around strange places to visit the homes of famous authors. He's never let me forget the time we walked 10 miles not finding Tennessee Williams' Florida home, or the 100+ mile trip to see Beatrix Potter's home in England. He just couldn't understand why I was so excited to see the actual cabbage patch where Peter Rabbit romped.

Today we hit a new low, when I dragged him to the home of Margaret Mitchell.

The house looked nice enough on the outside. I was more than happy to wait the 40 minutes for the next tour because I could amuse myself watching a documentary about the making of the wonderful Gone With The Wind movie.

Did you know Ms Mitchell was a newspaper reporter just like me? I didn't, and I was very excited to find this out. Even more so when I discovered we earnt about the same money, even though she wrote about 80 years before me.

At last it was time for the tour to begin.

"Fullow meah to the howese," said our jolly Southern tour guide. We walked obediently behind her into a very plain house, into a very plain room with a few photos on the wall.

"Here ah is a picture of Margaret's muthurr," she began. "Margaret leevud with herer round the cornah."

Very interesting. Not. When did she live in this house?

"Wer unce she ran by theese howese when she lawust her kitty cat," she continued.

The crowd started to shoot puzzled looks at each other.

To make sure this story doesn't turn out to be a long as GWTW, I'll cut it shawurt. Sorry, short.

Margaret lived in a tiny apartment at the back of the house for about five minutes. Although that room was furnished, none of the things in it were genuine, as our perhaps too honest guide was quick to point out.

"I cannot believe you've done this to me again," moaned Grumpy as we were ushered into a scant GWTW movie exhibit at the end.

"No look," I said. "This bit's good. It's the real front door frame from Tara. At least from the movie set, it wasn't a real house. And 15% of it was redone in 1989. And, oh never mind. Tomorrow's another day."