Andrew Willett, at it again.

Books/Baked Goods/Memewrangling

So I went to Books of Wonder, the best kids’ bookstore in NYC or anywhere else in the universe, so far as I can tell, the other day. My niece is turning 7 shortly, and I had duties to perform. (She recently saw Coraline, and expressed a desire to read the book. How can I say no? She’s also getting the fabulous Clan Apis. Science!)

Anyway, you can’t go to BoW without stopping at the cupcake counter. Or I can’t, anyway: it’s run by the fabulous Cupcake Cafe people. You can keep Magnolia Bakery’s vapid and oversweet efforts — the only reason people eat them, far as I can tell, is because they saw them on Sex and the City. For my money, CC’s dense cake and heavenly buttercream frosting whomp MB’s efforts into next week. And that’s without mentioning how totally beautiful their creations are to look at. Almost a shame to eat them, almost.

I told a friend about my visit — okay, I gloated about it — and he asked, “Did you take a picture for that website?”

“What website?”

Dudes with beards eating cupcakes.”

No, I didn’t, for the record. Maybe next time. But I was pleased to note it as an addition to an emerging internet meme: blogs entirely devoted to juxtapositions of three things. The other two sites I’ve seen are Selleck/Waterfall/Sandwich and Bea Arthur/Mountains/Pizza, which offer endless collections of weird surrealist landscapes. Dudes/Beards/Cupcakes doesn’t have the others’ zen-bouquet quality; instead it feels more like somebody’s personal fetish run amok. It’s noteworthy, I think, that they’re all tumblr blogs, but whether that tells us something about tumblr or the state of web culture in general I’m not sure. As to the inevitable why? In the words of Xeni Jardin at BoingBoing, “Because INTERNET.” And that’s the best explanation we’re likely to get.

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1 Comment

  1. Jose Jimenez

    clearly, i could resist the cupcake thing. i really wanted to take a picture but somehow chickened out.
    i love the concept that one man’s zen-bouquet is another’s personal fetish run amok.

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