While you wait for the apocalypse: The 2017 Haters Guide To The Williams-Sonoma Catalog

[ehrnst]

My friend, you look pale. Are you all right? I hope the sight of my houseservant, Mrs. Barker, staring hauntingly at you from the upstairs window as you came up the driveway didn’t frighten you. She’s really quite lovely. We like to think of her as part of the family. Perhaps you’re worn down by your travels. Or, perhaps you’re frazzled by the fact that you now live in a surrealist dystopia where a cabal of sinister oligarchs have conspired to exploit racial, sexual, and socioeconomic angst in order to accelerate the fundamental inequality of the American economy and consolidate all wealth not merely among the 1 percent, but soon the 0.1 percent, and then the 0.01 percent, and then the 0.001 percent, until there are only, like, three people with money left in the world.

I’m sure that’s an unpleasant prospect for you. Would you care for a Valrhona fudge round? I ordered them personally.

........................................................

ITEM #36-5482505 – SIX MONTHS OF CHEESE




Price: $299.95, plus $40 delivery

Copy: “For dedicated cheese enthusiasts”

Drew says: You better be at that price, holy shit. I like cheese as much as the next heart attack candidate but when I pay $300 for six months of cheese, that better amount to 9,000 pounds of cheese. I want a truck parked outside and tubes of liquid cheddar on tap in my basement. If you’re just sending me a stupid cheese platter every four weeks, that’s not acceptable to me. That is not six TRUE months of cheese. To me, six months of cheese means I can strip naked and tape the windows shut and live off that cheese for half the year, shutting myself in like a heroin addict. I don’t give a shit if Farmer Merle aged it in coffee and beeswax. I want quantity, otherwise I consider the Boska legacy sullied.

https://adequateman.deadspin.com/the-2017-hater-s-guide-to-the-williams-sonoma-catalog-1821181135

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. These are ALWAYS hilarious!

Thank you for the much-needed laughter!

[msongs]

2. was in a W S store this morning. little waffle iron $150 my old sunbeam cost $10 and still running

fine after 50 yrs (inherited it from grandma)

[not fooled]

13. eBay

I buy vintage, American-made, quality kitchen utensils and appliances. Got sick and tired of cheap Chinese-made junk that didn't work properly.

[bronxiteforever]

3. Lmao

[Shrike47]

4. Hit the link. You will be happy you did.

[NastyRiffraff]

6. I hit the link

and I am happy I did. I haven't laughed so hard in awhile.

[brer cat]

5. Those are priceless!

[Denzil_DC]

7. Thanks, that was brilliant!

In return, may I offer you Cap'n Wacky's Boatload of Yule Gallery of Unfortunate Christmas Cards?

A couple of samples:

There's nothing that sums up Christmas quite like the eyes of an excited child... unless those eyes are strange black holes with pin-point lights shining from them and set way too far apart. If this were my daughter, I'd be asking the wife if she remembers any strange lights taking her into the sky about nine months before the little one's birth.

http://www.capnwacky.com/holiday/cards1.html

I don't know what the artist was thinking here. Maybe he was just testing a theory that no matter what, if you put kids and a dog on a card it will sell. Even if there's been come kind of horrible snow storm that has covered all the houses up to their second stories and the two children are dragging the frightened puppy toward a chimney.

The dog knows what he's in for, and he's fighting. It's two against one, though, and the little devil children are going to win.

http://www.capnwacky.com/holiday/cards13.html

[marble falls]

8. Meh. Who works up that much dungeon over something he claims he doesn't give a shit about?

[MGKrebs]

9. You're scientist aren't you?

[marble falls]

11. Worse ....

A Lutheran.

[MGKrebs]

14. :-)

[smirkymonkey]

10. That was brilliant! He does this every year and they are always

hilarious! One of my favorite Yuletide traditions!

[Grammy23]

12. Back in 1963 when I was a mere slip of a girl,

my family moved to Cow Town, AKA, Ft. Worth, Tx. Shortly after moving there we discovered Neiman Marcus Stores. There were two, I think, at the time. One was in Ft. Worth and the other, the original, was in Dallas.

Somehow, we got on a mailing list to receive the Neiman Marcus Christmas catalog. My sister and I sat there in slack jawed amazement looking at His and Her Airplanes, Submarines and bath robes that were offered for a measly $1500. The sheer outrageousness of these items as Christmas gifts was not wasted on our impressionable minds. We knew it was ridiculous but we loved getting the catalog each year, never the less.

I haven’t seen one of their catalogs in years but I still remember looking in wide eyed wonder that there were people living in the same town where I did who could seriously consider buying airplanes or $1500 bathrobes for gifts. Maybe that was one of my first exposures to the concept that there are huge differences in the standards of living in the USA; that there really are the haves and the have mores. Lots more.

[The Mouth]

19. I was once an aspiring photographer.

Studied their catalogs quite a bit. Shooting for them is like shooting for National Geographic (or playing guitar for Steeley Dan)- if you're doing it you are, by definition, one of the most badass people in the world at your craft. I've done a bit of product photography, enough to appreciate them.

Whack stuff, tho'

[MGKrebs]

15. "I dont know what 90 percent of that sentence means but

...for $3,700 that fucker better extract more than just coffee. It better dispense, like, bitcoins. "

Great stuff.

[dhill926]

16. forwarded to all my Hater friends...

which is all my friends...

[ornotna]

17. Why is Ned laughing?

[The Mouth]

18. I go to the one in Sonoma. The people are very nice.

And I'd rather buy something overpriced from nice people who live in the community than online or at Wal Mart.

They also do have nice stuff, at least at the store, overpriced compared to JC Penney, Wally World or Amazon, but you can actually handle it (crucial with knives and pans). Their store in San Francisco is a beautiful architectural space.

Anyone who knows cheese could put together just as nice a selection for one tenth the amount, obviously.

[krispos42]

20. Okay, that was funny

[krispos42]

21. And I learned a new word today!

ITEMS #6853043-8297835 – THE SMEG KITCHEN

Drew says: I’m dying. SMEG. They put SMEG in huge letters across every one of these appliances, with no inkling at all that SMEG is two letters away from being foreskin cheese.

Those two extra letters would be "ma", as in "smegma"

Something that I was only vaguely aware existed and didn't know there was a word for.

I'm not looking for a picture, though, that's for damn sure.

[calimary]

22. This is hilarious!