Cover to Cover, Coast to Coast: Gnome Sweet Gnome (or You don't Gnome me!)

I'm coming clean. I love gnomes. Okay... I feel so much better to get that off my chest!

I do though. I think they are so funny and absolutely bizarre! And how fitting with Carolyn traveling and sending me postcards that I am reminded of a few several famous traveling gnomes, hence, the title for today's fun little entry!

So we all know the Travelocity Gnome. He is cheeky little roamer who happens to save you a bundle on your vacation plans. (Also a sponsor of The Amazing Race on CBS, which may one day be featuring these bloggers as contestants... just gotta fill out that application form...) I've used the Travelocity search engine just because I wanted that furry little face to tell me the best air fare! I've done a bit of traveling myself as of late and hope to do TONS more. And knowing that....

my sister bought me this as a joke for my birthday, born out of a few compounded jokes. First was that when our feet hurt the Toe Gnome is hunting for a new Toe Home and at the time I had no idea where I would be living next so I was gnomeless, I mean homeless. I wish I had had him when I was Down Under and Back East, but for now he travels around my room. (Really I move him from place to place for no other reason but to move him from place to place.) He is very friendly and like my cats. I think they play very fondly in the middle of the night which explains how often I find him across the room from his last destination. Anyway, my little gnomad comes with a passport and a booklet full of fun.

This Traveling Gnome phenomenon may have been spurred by Amile, a French film starring Audrey Justine Tautou. In the film Amile, a sheltered French girl, has a life changing epiphany in which she decides she will devote her life to bringing happiness to others. In one scene she steals her father's garden gnome and gives it to her air hostess friend asking her t

o take pictures of the gnome all over the world. Amile wants her recluse father to stop mourning her mother and fulfill his life long dream of world travel. And of course, before fin hits the screen, he is off. *Sigh* So cute.

After that I remember there have been several human interest stories about merry pranksters who steal lawn gnomes and copy Amile.

I assuming that's where the Traveling Gnome game originated, but Lawn Gnomes themselves can trace back their beginnings to Germany after the Second World War. They quickly became a staples for every yard, garden, terrace, courtyard, and patio throughout the UK and US. Gnomology maintains that there are three main categories of lawn gnomes, of which a Traveling gnome can be any.

First there are leisure gnomes.