Comrades! The Cake Ration Has Been Increased to 20 Grams!
Posted on February 27, 2009 Posted by John Scalzi 72 Comments
Presented for your oooohing and aaaahing, the cake my daughter made, and, clearly, decorated, last night. It is helpfully subtitled so that you may know your appropriate response to it. Feel free to respond thusly at your leisure.
Your leisure begins NOW.
Also, the first person who comments “the cake is a lie!” or some variation thereof, will, in an action filled with rich, creamy, homophonic irony, get dissolved in a barrel of lye. That is all.
All I want to know is, does Athena deliver? (because it’s breakfast time) And the mini candy bars laugh in the face of pathetic chocolate sprinkles. “Pah!” They say. “You call yourself a garnish? Ha!”
I love the squiggly leg on that “Y”. Athena knew her audience: that’s the weak-in-the-knees, toes curling appendage of the person sampling this confection.
Oh, and that M has the look of an exclamation point. It says M!
Well played, Athena. Well played.
The cake itself is clearly not a lie; it is right there.
That said, I am left wondering about the *caption* on the cake. From here it looks more nearly like a “Mmm;” perhaps a “Tasty!” and possibly even a “Brilliant!”. I do understand that fitting a “Brilliant” on a cake may be the height of extravagance. But accuracy is key in these kind of things, you know.
This could be a factor of the small size of the image, though. It may actually be a “yum.” I await your further description, Mr. Scalzi, of the proper exclamation upon consumption.
With baited breath.
OT:
In an effort to introduce two of my fellow bus riders to SF, I have handed them a couple of novels from what I consider “SF that non SF readers can read”.
One of them is my copy of Old Man’s War.
“MMMMMMM!” You just made a yummy noise.
Can I at least ask if the cake is delicious and moist?
Not when I have science to do, Acheron.
OK, I’m with you on the icing, and the mini chocolate bars, and the animal cookies. Those are all good.
But why on earth are there soft-boiled eggs on the cake?
01010100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01100011 01100001 01101011 01100101 00100000 01101001 01110011 00100000 01100001 00100000 01101100 01101001 01100101 00101110 00001101 00001010 00001101 00001010
As if I couldn’t read binary, Kate. Into the lye with you!
Who’s next?
Dammit.
(This lye stuff hurts, btw.)
Ummm… YUM! LOL! I would be afraid to say anything else. What with the lye and all.
You and Your Devil Spawn Daughter should not be tempting me with things like this so early in the morning. Must. Eat. Cake. Soon.
I’m totally submitting this to Cake Wrecks.
(Not really, as it’s a: not a wreck, and b: not done by a professional baker, but you should all be following Cake Wrecks and I just wanted to let you know that.)
I love Cake Wrecks. But yes, this one doesn’t quite qualify.
Kate’s binary translates into, “The cake is a lie.”
Where’s the “…or death” part of the equation?
Eddie:
Athena tackled that one last year.
Clearly the cake is upside down. I really enjoy Athena’s interpretation of simian smokejumpers parachuting in to fight yonder conflagration.
Leaflet Policy Enforcement Division
Sector: 12-A
Office: 1502
Subject: Illegal Foodstuffs
It has come to our attention that an item that has been banned from the offices of MegaCommentCorp has recently been spotted in this ‘blog’. Specifically, cake.
Informants have described the ‘cake’ as ‘delicious’, ‘moist’, ‘full of win’, ‘a lie’, ‘a lye’, and ‘relatively free of cat hair’.
As per issued company leaflet CP3987/1-rev2, all banned items must be delivered to Office 1502 in Sector 12-A. Do not eat any of the banned item, else you will be forced to sit in the YELLOW chair.
That is all.
Yum!
It shouldn’t be et. It’s too aesthetically pleasing. Seriously, it looks like an ad for cake. Cake that you want to eat. Cake that is yum. In stylish colors.
This cake has friends, so clearly the cake is allied.
I mourn the passing of a delicious and moist bit of Portal’s dark humor. Killed by too many fanboys. We loved too much, and spent the web’s tolerance too fast.
But there’s no sense crying over every mistake.
I’ll risk the barrel for this.
In this case, overused phrase about the cake = lye.
I’ll throw myself in now.
And the cake looks delicious, may you never run out.
I’m currently on a diet, so I would relish every bite. Even those two pink dots on it, which mystify me. All I know is that they look like candy, and that will have to suffice.
I consider it cruel to photograph a sheet cake from directly above so as to obscure the TYPE of cake from view. Doubly so when baked in Pyrex. There is the hint of devil’s food on one edge, but nothing conclusive.
I for one hope for homemade carrot cake or – dare I dream? – spice cake!
YUM!!!!!
Cake Garnish checklist:
Chocolate frosting spelling the word ‘YUM’ -check
Hershey’s Miniature chocolate bars -check
Teddy Grahams, Chocolatey Chip flavor -check
Brach’s Butterscotch hard candy -che… wait, what? Ouch!
A truly innovative chef is not afraid to push boundries.
Now that we have a Yum cake, phase two should include a Nom Nom Nom cake. It’s a process. Made of cake.
@Robrobb
The British government has learned that Athena recently attempted to obtain significant amounts of yellow cake mix from a grocery store. Make of this what you will.
I just woke up (it’s 7:30 on the West Coast), first blog I clicked on this morning. And what do I see? Cake.
It’s going to be a good day.
Athena’s cake decorating skills are impressive.
JS @10:
Nobody. You only said that the first person who said that would be dissolved in lye.
The cake is a lie.
What Cake?
There is no proof there is cake.
I see a glass pan. How deep? Could be 1/4 inch deep and with just some white stuff. Crisco? and some other items. Is Yum spelled in grease? Granted the hershey’s miniatures and the little bear things could be real. And the other item? no clue.
But I see no evidence of cake. The photographer purposely took the picture at such an angle to mislead the viewers of this site.
So yes it is a lie. There is no proof of cake so therefore it does not exist.
And the Author does in fact hint to this fact with the title of the post. “Comrades!” He is in fact referring to another internet Meme.
In Soviet Russia you do not eat cake.
In Soviet Russia the cake eats you!
So in all the Author has chosen to lie to you about the status of the cake and then distract the readers in such a way that they do not see the truth.
Shame on You.
Shame on You.
Can’t. Get. To. Ohio. . . Must. Bake. Cake.
muy yum
>>>homophonic irony
Why are you always dragging sex into these things?
Sexcrime!!
Now I want cake. I’ve managed to resist the King Cake we bought from Ele’ (formerly Taste of Elegance) since Tuesday night, & the man cooperated by eating the rest of it the next 2 days. It was the BEST King Cake I’ve ever had. If you’re ever near South Dayton, you should visit Ele’ for any of their delightful pastries, cake, cookies & pies.
Dang. Now I’m drooling. Oh, Athena, you temptress, you.
So, what are the specifics of this cake? Details on the cake, frosting, decorations, etc., please.
All your cake are belong to us!
The child is evil, showing off cake in front of a sugar-deficient person like that. It’s been a long week, and I want cake, dammit!
Elder Monster is a culinary student. I believe that when he returns from school today, I will demand that he bakes his tired Mama a cake.
Hopefully the cake was indeed yummy. Otherwise, the lie was the cake.
JEANNE @5: “I didn’t make a yummy sound, I just asked you what it is.”
The beauty of this post is the timing. It’s Friday, I’m off tomorrow, so I’ll have time to bake a cake of my own this evening. Epic Win!!!
My wife and I like to cook and bake as a team so we have extra time together doing things we like. Double win.
Then we can eat said cake with good coffee later this evening. Triple Epic Win points!!!!!!!
Thanks Athena for helping start my weekend with fun AND chocolate.
Diet be damned 8D
Yum! I am really hungry now, but I have no cake. Sad.
Great cake! It looks like Athena had fun decorating it and it looks tempting.
OT: I sent in my Millennicon membership today. You might consider posting a reminder since the deadline for reserving hotel rooms and mail in memberships is tomorrow.
Why, this is a triumph! HUGE success. I’m making a note. I think it’s particularly awesome that your preteen has a better grasp of symmetry, color scheme, and fitting-all-the-letters-on-the-cake-surface than some of the professionals at Cake Wrecks. Also, I want a piece with candy bar on it. (Darn, does his mean Whatever is another blog I can’t read before breakfast now?)
Hm. Let’s see, Google Maps says it’ll take me roughly 9 hours to get there. All I need now is night vision goggles, dog-proof armor, and something to immobilize Scalzi (perhaps a case of Coke Zero), and the cake can be mine!
No, it wouldn’t be simpler to make my own. Are you mad?
Damn. I’m going to have to go home and bake, now.
Unless someone has solved the problem of how to sendfoodstuffs via e-mail, and Mr Scalzi is willing to share.
Is it chocolate cake?
The barrel is a lye.
“Thus” is already an adverb; “thusly” is not a word.
:)
HAHA reading Tom’s comment (#34) I had to laugh. My friend told me about a prank his brother pulled on him. Brother asks “Hey do you want some vanilla ice cream?” So my friend agrees and is handed a cone of vanilla ice cream.
He takes a big lick and is immediately horrified. His brother has just handed him a cone with a ice cream scoop of Crisco on top.
I hope she had as much fun making it as it looks like it will be to eat. I always thought it was more fun to make birthday cakes for my younger brothers and sister than it was to eat them (the cakes!) I still like to bake cakes to take to meetings, restraining myself enough so that that people are surprised, rather than expecting them.
(Some of you may discover the joys of being repeatedly dipped in the lye barrel, rather than simply being dissolved.)
Now that we’ve been provided with cake, can Athena do something about the ponies?
The cake is a…. yum, apparently.
Yes.
If we steal the lye, can we say “All Your Base Are Belong To Us”?
Aw, man.
@56 Arrow – I see what you did there!
*groan*
@56
WTG Arrow. 9 mins till I go home and I needed that.
Layers within layers. FTW!
Tom@34 – At which school did you study for the profession of Fair Witness?
Eeex-elent cake-ness!
Devil’s food or double fudge chocolate for extra points.
Tom @59. Layer cake!
I’m really impressed with her icing calligraphy… especially that Y. She’s quite artistic.
Arrow, that was a half-acid pun.
@57: I presume this means I get to live?
@58: Well it wouldn’t be funny if you didn’t get it!
@59: Glad to be of assistance.
@64: Heheheheheh.
@60 Janice
I am just saying. Look at the picture.
Ok standard Pyrex Pyrex 15X10 dish.
Like this: http://www.shopworldkitchen.com/index.asp?pageid=231&upc=71160010406
Then look at the depth on the sides. IE where there is glass but no cake/frosting/whatever.
It looks like there is a lot of glass and no stuff. In fact it kinda appears that the side goes down to near the bottom of the pan.
I in fact do not see cake. I see glass pan w/ white substance in it.
And then John talks about how no jokes about the Cake being a lie and hmmm
hmmm
And I know cake since just had my birthday last week and did in fact eat cake. Of course you only have my word since I chose to eat the cake. My wife might in fact confirm the cake as she did bake it but then again she might not just because she could do that.
Now Brownies.. I could maybe see brownies since they do not rise as much but cake.. just don’t see it there.
@52 Pockypimp
Hmmm that brings up ideas. Evil Ideas but still ideas.
The cake is our supporter
The cake has befriend us
The cake supports us
The cake is ally
*holds his nose and runs screaming from Quiver Arrowshaft’s quip*
That was a punishing abasement of the language!
Pockypimp@52,
Hmmmm. Similar to the time that my [older] siblings and I told our younger sister that the bar of cocoa butter was really chocolate. 40-plus years later, she still brings that up.
Another fun time can be had by buying a package of Ex-Lax and breaking it up and putting it on a dish in the living room.
Any child in 3 miles will be drawn to the “chocolate”.
Learned this from my Father who accidentally ate his Grandma’s “Chocolate” many moons ago.
You people. So evil to the little ones.
Thank you!
Also for those people who work in offices where people steal your snacks. Ex-Lax Cookies! Always good to have stolen from your desk/locker/fridge/whatever.