Cake pops

They’re cute, sure. Adorable, in fact.

However.

The Zooey Deschanel of desserts, this twee treat gives me a toothache just thinking about its sweetness. Generally made of boxed (i.e. processed) cake mix and sugar, lots of sugar, these pops are more precious than playful. They are edible craft projects. When a recipe calls for an edible ink pen, the dessert becomes a fondon’t in my cookbook.

All this could perhaps be forgiven if the cake pop actually tasted amazeballs. It doesn’t. Sorry to skewer this treat trend, but I’d rather be knee-deep in a piece of pie.

(photo: bakerella.com)

Punch Bowl Winners' Circle: Stuff made from neckties

I couldn't believe it when I saw this photo, because it's for a show at the Textile Center in Minneapolis, which is a nationally-known and respected center for fiber arts. Did they run out of good ideas? What's with the sensible shoes? Ack! If I made this purse I would puke on myself. If someone gave it to me, I would puke on them. Not that I'm an ungrateful person, I just have this aversion to ties being made into anything else. Perhaps this is a sign that ties are really not earth-friendly, because there is so no way to reuse them and not look absolutely hideously ridiculous.

Unfortunately, the website for the Textile Center does not have this picture on it. Instead there are pictures of richly colored textiles from India, the current show in the Joan Mondale gallery. Perhaps they deemed a photo of the tie purse too embarrassing to leave up on the website. But the postcard provides shock value and gets your attention amidst a pile of other junk mail. Hmmm.

The point is, ties are ugly. Not ugly like Ugly Dolls, which are cute, or dogs that are so ugly they are endearing. Ties have no soul. They try to be bearable as ties, and sometimes they are, just barely. But most of the time they are cheesy, over-the-top with power madness, or just plain dull. And surprise, surprise, none of these are features I look for when I'm hunting for fabric! So although I can understand the urge people have to turn them into something else, unfortunately they're always going to be recognizable as the hideous soul-crushing uniform of corporate America. Perhaps cutting them up in very small and unrecognizable bits and leaving them out for birds to bling up their nests with would be a more humane gesture all around...

—Carrie, Finding Jim Macinko, Alterior Motives

Personally, I am sort of charmed by quirky re-imagined neckties, but I take Carrie's point.

(photo: Carrie)