Would you expect to see a People’s Friend annual 1998 in an expensive holiday home?

[ThePieceHall]

As per the title, DD2 and I are staying in an expensive holiday home on the coast in North Yorkshire. The bookshelf is the tiredest and saddest I have ever seen. There is actually a People’s Friend annual from 1998. The weather has been glorious and we have been on the Blue Flag beach for hours every day so we have not had to open the really tired and dated jigsaws. Thankfully. Would I be unreasonable to point out to the hosting company that a little bit of investment and a little bit of respect for paying holidaymakers would not go amiss?

I always thought Reader's Digest was strange. Like, what was the point of only being able to read bits and bobs of things, and not even able to choose which bits and bobs they were, never knowing about the rest, much less seeing it, before it was chopped to bitesize by persons unknown.

And then along came the internet.

Just to confirm that because I am a try hard/too-cool/pompous asshole (as described by previous posters), I will be leaving a stack of The Simple Things magazines. I have a subscription but I save up months at a time so I can enjoy on my holidays. We love where we are staying and we will definitely rebook. I imagine that I will still be coming here in my dotage. No doubt the magazines I leave behind will outlive me.

A review, please?

😂

Spend a fiver in a charity shop and put a couple of books/jigsaws that you do approve of. Thats how shelves like that tend to work anyway - via swaps and donations.

Peoples friend must still be popular with older women because its still published.

I'd be fascinated by it as a time capsule, and the rest of the 'tired' bookshelf, more than if it looked like a modern bookshop or a typical holiday reading bookshelf. Because I could get that anywhere.

I’ll post a photo for historical reasons.

Circa 10+ years ago I stayed at an upmarket period property and was apalled to find a Dickens novel on the bookshelf. I was so disappointed as had been hoping to find '50 Shades of Grey'.

We stayed in a big house on the Isle of Wight last year that had a wonderful collection of books - literary, popular, travel writing, biography...but from 25 to 50 years earlier when I guess the owners were growing up there.

Oh god, I hate The Simple Things. I subscribed for a while but it was so twee and curiously depressing.

A bedtime story, The People’s Friend-style.

I really think it’s so wholesome and homely

Well, horses for courses. Clearly very many here love The People’s Friend. Because I am a self-flagellating idiot, shall I post the books I have brought on holiday with me so everyone can critique?

I'm 50 so I don't subscribe to The People's Friend. But my mum liked it when she retired.

And non-accepting of society’s changing demographics?

Oooh I don’t know …..sorry I just thought it looked nice, I like the dog especially, nice touch

“So kind. I can’t actually believe that it’s still going. Every day is a school day. Personally, I would rather have a subscription to a daily enema. But, you know, horses for courses.”

I’m certain I would rather be curled up in a corner reading the People’s Friend on a weekly basis than shitting myself inside out daily.

I remember being given a big pile of Judy and Debbie comic books when I was getting probably a bit old for such things technically at around 13, passed on from someone who was five years older or so, but I absolutely devoured them. Looking back I think some must have belonged to her mother as well. They were very old-fashioned but I couldn't put them down.

I’m so sorry but I don’t know what you mean by this? As a person, I don’t shit myself inside out ever?

I've just had a look at The Simple Things and it's not far off People's Friend , as far as I can make out. Editions called Nest, Nourish and Amble, "recipes" that are basically "putting things on a plate", articles on gardening and buying things in charity shops. All pensioner approved content.

Oh, okay, I get it now!

Well, yer in Yorkshire love. The' careful wi' ther brass on that side o' Pennines. 😉

Without the bigotry, the sexism, the religion, the ‘traditional’ values.

What you don't know is that the people walking down the path are cult members and the guy in the doorway has an axe. The People's Fiend.

Plus it isn't really snowing. They just want you to think it is.

Agreed! But we also live in Yorkshire! On the really tight side. Yorkshire born and bred. I do feel like this is beyond tight. And veering into taking the piss territory.