The Shoemaker's Children

Have you ever heard the expression that, "The shoemaker's children go barefoot!" Never was this saying more true than in my house last week. Last week, for anyone living under a rock, was my 33rd birthday. I know, I know, I only look 21. Anyway - given the state of my wallet, er, the economy, I didn't really want any big gifts this year. I ended up asking DH for something useful which would cost him about $10, and a birthday cake. In previous years DH and the kids have baked me a cake (with a bit of unsolicited advice from me.)

This year, after baking hundreds of cakes for everyone else, I asked DH to get me an ice cream cake (because I llluuurrvveee ice cream). I specified the flavours (with back up options) and said I didn't care what store it came from as long as it wasn't Dairy Bell (grossest ice cream ever) and wasn't vanilla (I hate vanilla.)

The morning of my birthday, I say to DH, "Oooh, I'm so excited! Ice cream birthday cake which is not vanilla and not crappy Dairy Bell!" at which point DH looks a little sheepish and says, "Yeah. Well...ummm...about that..."

Those of you who are into foreshadowing will know what comes next, but I beg you to stay with me so I've not written this blog post in vain.

Turns out he outsourced the buying of the ice cream cake to his brother. This alone pisses me off, because I gave DH several WEEKS to get organised. Anyhow, I've already told him off about that so no need to do it again here, tempting as it is. (You all should feel free, though, to admonish him in the comments of this post.)

So DH gave his brother the requirements (only TWO requirements, remember) ...and then when DH called to check that his brother had bought it, his brother says, "Yeah, I ordered it from Dairy Bell!" DH choked when he heard that, but then he found out it was vanilla, DH knew that he should dig out his combat gear. He also hoped like hell that I'd have a sense of humour about this...because let's just say that normally these kinds of things cause me to go, well, TOTALLY APESHIT. Seriously, people. I rarely ask for stuff...and he farked this up as royally as one can.

I should also say at this point that my DH has the dubious honour of giving the most crappy gifts. His heart is always in the right place, but he falls over totally when faced with the stress of having to find something which I might like. Over the years I've gotten all sorts of weird stuff - giant illustrated religious texts (what the...?), all manner of ugly jewellery and so on. I've learned to just tell him straight out what it is I want. Sadly, as evidenced by this story, I don't think that method is working! (Although he did get the present right.)

Back to the story. DH (claims he) was totally befuddled by this, especially since his brother asked about alternative flavours, and told DH he would get it from ColdRock (Australian equivalent of Cold Stone Creamery.) Neither he nor I are entirely sure what went wrong there...and DH is much too nice a guy to let me call my BIL and ask. It should be said that my BIL is a very nice chap, and does all sorts of nice things for us and the trio...and while, for blogging purposes, I really want to know what went wrong, DH didn't want to embarass or upset his brother.

(Fair enough. BIL, if you're reading this, we all love and adore you...but seriously...you think I could let this incident go by and not blog about it?)

By then they couldn't do really anything about it (late Xmas Eve) so they were stuck with it..and DH, well, I like to think he lost at least a little bit of sleep over it. In the end I just laughed and laughed and laughed...because not only was it vanilla, from the crappy ice cream store, but it was the most Mo-Fo-Bugly cake you have ever seen. It was iced with this mint green and cream combo, and on top there was a little swirl of cream coloured icing and two...wait for it... pale blue silk rosebuds and plastic leaves stuck in it. Yes, the kind I've not seen since 1975. The year I was born.

Bwahahahahahahahaha! Worst cake EVER. Falls short of being a cake wreck (because it was at least presentable) but man, it was bad. I haven't laughed that hard in a long time. The cake was not dissimilar to the picture above, which was stolen from the DB website. I was truly heartbroken that my camera was out of comission, because it really needed to be seen to be appreciated in all it's 1970's glory. For those who are curious, I did actually eat it (because I really did feel bad for DH) but I did take the time to slather it in Ice Magic to mask the totally disgusting taste.

Lesson learned - next time, I'm ordering my own cake!