How many times must a baker be told,
"Don't pipe 'flowers' where flowers belong?"
And how many colors are spelled correctly,
While still managing to be wrong?
While still managing to be wrong?
How many directions are misunderstood,
Like the first Wreck that received such renown?
And how many ways can you try to explain,
That "nothing"'s still something written down?
The answer, my friend, is blowing in the wind.
The answer is "italicized" like it's blowing in the wind!Thanks to Anna B., Alexis, Erica, David H., & Rosej, with the thanks "fuzzy" like a warm hug. (Only not in a creepy way.)
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That worm cake says it all. Read in the voice of a downtrodden housewife who has lost all hope. Under that read, "I can't believe this still happens." Accentuate "still."
wv: flitank: A tank in which to store your flit.
One of the things that gets me with these pipe-the-directions cakes is how much EXTRA work they're putting in to do that piping, when a wee bit of comprehension at the start would save time and lead to happier customers.
its sad, the "underneath that" cake is so cool looking, yet still full of fail.
Shame about that last one... it would have been a really nice cake if somebody hadn't totally failed their Common Sense class, which should be a required class for all cake decorating schools.
That last one is such a fail.
I saw the title and started giggling even before I saw the cakes. I just LOVE IT when it's gonna be the occasional sing-a-long. 'zactly what I needed this a.m. Thanks
wv: birtioni-- that special pasta for once a year.
Congrats on Rachael Ray!!!!!! Just watched it :-D I've been following CWs for over a year now.
Rachael Ray showed off some of the cake wrecks on her show today =) Congrats!!
Jenny
Hooray, a sing-along!
Thank goodness that last cake was a large sheet cake and the wreckerator had somewhat legible piping. Can you imagine the same message squeezed onto an 8" round?
the lack of critical thinking skills is staggering.
meanwhile, I can't help but wonder if Ben and Flowers are a fraternal twin strip act with repttiles?
Order the "Nothing" cake. For when you feel like dirt.
and worms.
haha i absolutely love these. You would think they would say hey what color did they want "happy Birthday Alexis in pink" in?. and then realize what they just said
That last cake would have been so darn pretty if the baker had used some common sense.
"Oh! They want the font to LOOK like it's blowing in the wind!!! That makes sense!"
Why must bakers constantly jack things up due to thier lack of common sense???
-B
Those folks who made those cake 'errors' are something else. I guess when the Lord was giving out brains, they thought He said 'trains' and asked for a slow one? LOL
Oh my. That last one is the best. cake. ever.
I really don't know how these people get through the day. And it's sooo long! You would imagine that about halfway through they might actually realize it...
I swear I'm starting to think that the decorators are being dense on purpose just to end up in your blog. That's the only explanation I can come up with because such a high level of not-thinking makes me want to weep.
Brilliant post. Again.
Ah, and the apostrophe in "flower's" is just (you should pardon the expression) the icing on the cake.
You guys make me "LOL please draw the smiley or use the abbreviation not the words Laugh Out Loud in all caps . . . "
Literal LOLs!!
I just had a huge AHA moment.
The cake decorators all speak English as a second language!!!!
Don't correct me if I'm wrong. I NEED to believe this.
Hey! We're officially famous! We were on the Rachael Ray show!!!
BWAHAHAH these give me the biggest laughs
I think it's so sweet that Ben and Flowers have the same birthday. What a lovely cake!
At least it's all spelled correctly, leaving aside the apostrophe on the first one....
I do love literal people. Thanks for the Monday laughs!
That frog on the first cake was also pretty nifty.
Forgot to say -- good song parody! Now do "Puff the Magic Dragon!"
wv - bloesq
It's not really windy out -- just sort of bloesq
This blog restores my faith in humanity...well, not really, but it does make me laugh, and that's just as valuable.
wv - fieseco: What a Cake Wreck becomes.
The last one is hilarious!
The last cake is just so pretty! Then you read it, bang your head repeatedly into the keyboard, and cry a little. Its not that they don't read, its that they have a filter between the reading and comprehending parts of the brain.
Best use of a Civil War-era protest song, EVAR!!!!
I like that the frog has his tongue stuck out, like he knows what kind of cake he's on. "Bleah," says Mr. Frog. "Bleah."
Also, the last cake has such pretty letters! A shame they went to so much extra work when it looks like what was requested was actually within their capacity (unlike, possibly, the frog baker).
I'm convinced that these decorators are new to this country and don't speak English. That has to be the only way there are this many mistakes out there.
That doesn't mean that I'll stop giggling uncontrollably when I see cakes like these!
As a huge cakewrecks and Bob Dylan fan, I find this post particularly amazing! I sang the whole thing!
I think people assume too much these days when they expect people to have "common sense"-- surely an oxymoron. It's not just cake decorators either; it's a pandemic. Just come and meet my coworkers. Libby's idea is excellent. "common sense" classes should be mandatory-- but not just for bakers!
However, kudos to the decorator of the last cake on their penmanship. At least you passed something in school.
This post takes the cake. Now if you guys could only take those cake decorators and shake some sense into them. :-)
That last cake was the icing on the, well, cake. This post was brilliant! Such a great set up for that last disaster. Awesome.
wv: revour = what a dog does to its own vomit. Yeah, I grossed myself out with that one.
That last cake is so gorgeous...it's too bad they screwed up the inscription.
why oh why don't they just change the cake order forms to have an inscription section and a directions section????why why why for the love of dessert why!
Wouldn't it be a great story if the song "Pretty in Pink" was inspired by a wreck?
I really don't understand the first one! I mean clearly the directions were to put on it "happy birthday ben and flowers and a steam-rolled frog" and yet they got the frog part right! :D
I am always amazed at the limitless cake wrecks.
The fourth cake is an epic fail XD
#1 is wishing a HAPPY BiRTHDAY to Ben and Flower's what -- frog?
#2 Finally, balloon strings that look like strings. Too bad the balloons look like a piping bag malfunction. The color fiasco is easily explained: "We didn't have pink, so we used green." Who says wreckerators have no common sense.
#3 If the cake had been just a little bigger, they could have included the last line: "In All Different Colors, With Sprinkles."
#4 Is there a better message for a dirt & worms cake than 'Nothing'?
#5 "Best of luck in WindyCity."
(I never knew 'italicized' meant 'run together' -- guess ya learn something new everyday.) If only the decorator who did most of the work could have stayed to write the inscription.
How did Dylan write a Civil War-era protest song? Time machine, maybe? [Ducks and runs...]
I think the "nothing" on the next to the last cake was actually put there to draw your eye away from the randomly strewn gummy worms and crumbs.
Couldn't resist WV: firoses - "dat spot where you put dat frog was s'posed to be firoses"
Honestly, I think the cake decorators do it on purpose.
I'm terribly passive aggressive, with a wide range of work-related pet peeves. I'm sure there must be some cake decorators like me.
If a rude or condescending customer wrote detailed descriptions all over the line that specified "WHATEVER IS WRITTEN HERE WILL BE WRITTEN ON THE CAKE!!" I would definitely pipe it a cake just like the 'Windy City' and hand it to them, feigning innocence. "Why, I piped exactly what you wrote on the form. I cannot offer a refund for your mistake."
This might make me a bad person, but I honestly think that's where these cakes come from.
It could also be a 'corporate policy' thing at chain stores that the decorators are not allowed to 'interpret' what they think the customer wants written on the cake; they must write exactly what the customer has written, even if their common sense tells them otherwise. Should they have called the customer and checked before piping? Probably. But if the customer was rude to them? They might skip it. I certainly would.
Another great post. You nailed it!
For the first cake: the baker was asked for flowers.
So he put an iguana.
Yeah OKAY.
Everything about that last cake is gorgeous! Too bad it was ruined by yet another miscommunication...
I love the Windy City one!!
I so love that you parodied an entire song just to get to that last cake!
@Becky 12:36 PM - No, sad to say, after working in a state office for almost 20 years and reviewing many, many written examples of "standard American English" as interpreted by native speakers...of standard American English (whatever that may be), I can attest that the problem stretches across the entire spectrum of those who use writing to communicate. Still, makes for much better Wrecks!
My personal favorite has to be the worm cake that says "Nothing." After all, what is more of a waste of money then sprinkling Oreos and gummy worms then an addition of hot pink frosting that makes absolutely no sense.
Do wreckerators get paid by the letter? Is that why that put all of the unnecessary extra effort into piping all of the instructions on the cake as well as the original message?
The last one - such a pretty cake. Such a wreck of a sentiment...
Nobody likes me, everybody hates me, guess I'll go eat worms...and cake. With nothing on it.
Just last week, my co-worker piped instructions on a cake...I couldn't believe it!! I work with a Cake Wrecker!! :)
I think a lot of these mistakes are caused by the decorator being distracted while writing, overworked with lots of orders or doesn't read the order form thoroughly!
Please, Please, Please have #1 sing this! This post made me so happy. Way to bring back these classic wrecketypes with a classic song.
I don't know why, but I love the last cake.
The answer, my friend, is throw it in the bin...
Ok, a dead frog on cake #1 and a colorblind wreckorator on the "pink" thing. Banner Monday.
ARGGGHHHHHH!
Obviously most decorators can READ (though comprehension is questionable) so why can't someone come up with a simple order form that clearly breaks down the items?:
-INSCRIPTION
-INSCRIPTION NOTES (STYLE, CASE, COLOR, ETC.)
-DECORATION
I do believe the "italicized" cake is one of my favorites!
wv: emblette: When the ingredients in your omlette sink below the surface and are embedded in the egg.
Every time I see instructional cakes gone awry, I wonder if the human race is doomed...(in pink with flowers please!)
I'm with Courtney... these (at least some, if not most) have, have, HAVE to be on purpose. There simply is no other reason why there seems to be SO MANY of them. I'm not complaining, I'm just pguessing that, for grocery chain store cake decorators who don't give a damn because this wasn't their dream job, having their wreck make it onto the esteemed Cake Wrecks blog is some sort of trophy to them. Or maybe customers who specifically order cakes this way then send the pics in hoping their cake will make it on the blog. My brain refuses to accept the idea that there are actually THIS many idiots out there who do this without realizing it.
Arghhh who would pay for these?? Lol if you know it isn't right just don't buy the thing. And that nothing cake.. really is nothing. I don't know why they can't figure out that you don't put directions on cakes. Guess they all like wrecking poor customers cakes.
Thank you for brightening my Monday - it's not just that you do this, it's that you do it so well! ;)
I hate to think that there are that many wreckers out there, but I have to admit - if I got one of those I'd buy it just so I could laugh at it and submit a photo to you!
Hey Jenn, I don't know if you saw it or heard about it, but on Rachael Ray, they briefly talked about CW, and that Rachael is a fan of it.
Do you suppose these are along the lines of "there is no such thing as bad publicity"? I suppose it conflicts with "the customer is always right," though that one seems to have gone out of favor lately.
Very funny wrecks today (well, yesterday, as I'm posting on Tuesday)!
Hey, but Gilmore Girls sure saw this coming! "Green is the new pink"
:D
Oh, that blowing in the wind cake! The lettering is so dang beautiful! Beautiful, and oh so wrong.
I think that even Dylan would have to laugh---certainly one of the funniest parodies of a great song!
The sad thing is, the script on the last one is beautiful -as is the cake!
This reminds me of my own cake wreck. I bought a cake for my sister's birthday. Her name is Monika-- note the less common spelling. I suppose it was my fault for not writing it down, but I got: "Happy Birthday Monica with a k!"