April 4, 2015

Finally, some cake other than same-sex wedding cake is in the news...

... in this NYT interview with Senator Tom Cotton:
Do you have any guilty pleasures? I run a lot every morning.

That sounds neither guilty nor pleasurable. But I do it so I can indulge in the guilty pleasure of eating birthday cake.

Every day? Most days, with ice cream. Early on, when my wife and I were dating, we went to the grocery store, and I told her that sometimes I just buy birthday cakes, and I eat them. And she said: “Really? I do, too.”
IN THE COMMENTS: Ignorance is Bliss asks: "Is a cake a birthday cake if it wasn't bought for someone's birthday?"

I think the best answer to that is that Tom Cotton and his wife like to eat a kind of cake that they think of as "birthday cake." Either they like the idea of calling it "birthday cake" or they go stores where it is labeled birthday cake or has "Happy Birthday" written in the icing. What kind of people are they that they enjoy that kind of cake — light, spongy cake with thick, sugary white icing— or they get a kick out of a birthday feeling when it's not anyone's birthday?

I think of 2 things:

1. The Beatles "You say it's your birthday/It's my birthday too." When that song came out, it was generally understood — as I remember it — to refer to something other than one's actual birthday. Both Paul McCartney and John Lennon said later that they just set out to write a birthday song. Paul said it wasn't anyone's birthday, but birthday songs get played. And John said "It was a piece of garbage." If I remember correctly, we hippies of the time thought The Beatles were offering the theory that every day is your birthday or every day that you achieve heightened awareness of your existence is a birthday.

2. The idea of an "un-birthday" in the Humpty Dumpty chapter of Lewis Carroll's "Through the Looking-Glass," which is combined with Carroll's Mad Hatter's Tea Party (from "Alice In Wonderland") in the Disney movie "Alice in Wonderland." In the movie, Alice arrives at the party as the Hatter and others are singing "A Very Merry Unbirthday to You." In the book, Humpty Dumpty explains that "there are three hundred and sixty-four days when you might get un-birthday presents... And only one for birthday presents, you know. There's glory for you!" Alice doesn't understand his use of the word "glory," which leads Humpty Dumpty to utter his most famous line (beloved of lawyers): "When I use a word... it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less." (In this view, "glory" means "a nice knock-down argument.") I'm thinking that when Tom Cotton eats cake, it's birthday cake if he chooses to think of it as birthday cake.

27 comments:

Ignorance is Bliss said...

Is a cake a birthday cake if it wasn't bought for someone's birthday?

J. Farmer said...

Come and put your name on it
Put your name on it
Come and put your name on it
Your name
Bet you wanna put your name on it
Put your name on it
Come and put your name on it
Ba-ba-baby

It's not even my birthday
But he want to lick the icing off
I know you want it in the worst way
Can't wait to blow my candles out

He want that cake, cake,
Cake, cake, cake, cake, cake
Cake, cake, cake, cake, cake
Cake, cake, cake

Charlie Currie said...

Every day? Most days, with ice cream. Early on, when my wife and I were dating, we went to the grocery store, and I told her that sometimes I just buy birthday cakes, and I eat them. And she said: “Really? I do, too.”

That made me smile...

gspencer said...

Still shaking my head that Mark Pryor had actually been Arkansas's senator for years.

Patrick said...

In even better cake news, my wife has made my favorite chocolate cake. The recipe include about 2 cups of stout beer. She is not a fan is chocolate, so I know she loves me.

jr565 said...

Is anything more important that the wedding cakes stories?

jr565 said...

Every day is somebody's birthday. So why not have a cake a day?

Freeman Hunt said...

Then on your birthday, you have birthday broccoli to fulfill the expected contrast.

Laslo Spatula said...

This might be the place to tease out any subtle differences between the expressions 'cake-hole' and 'pie-hole.'

I am Laslo.

Freeman Hunt said...

Guests are a little nonplussed.

Unknown said...

My wife got me a birthday cake last week, it has crappy icing, not the butter and sugar mixture that is the good grocery store icing. Normally I would kill a cake in 2 days tops, this one goes to the chickens. The baker maybe thought she was gay and gave her yucky cake. I want my old non gay good icing cake.

Hagar said...

I like broccoli, and I do not like "birthday cake."

It takes all kinds.

Mark said...

it has crappy icing, not the butter and sugar mixture that is the good grocery store icing

Back in the day, you would bake and frost your own cake. They had (and still do) have these boxes of pretty good cake mix. But they also had what I remember as really good dry frosting mix in a box. Then they came out with the already-made plastic jars of frosting. Then they got rid of the dry frosting mix, which had called for adding softened butter (and maybe a touch of water?), and was quite good. The already-made stuff, while convenient, was made with oil and other crap, which of course makes for so-so frosting at best.

paminwi said...

Cake every day? Look at him! He must have a high metabolism rate to eat cake very day and still be so slim. Maybe people who make fun of this are just jealous they can not do the same.

Annie said...

Is a cake a birthday cake if it wasn't bought for someone's birthday?

Yes because those store bought cakes are usually made and bought for birthdays.

rhhardin said...

ee cummings

your birthday comes to tell me this

—each luckiest of lucky days
i’ve loved,shall love,do love you,was

and will be and my birthday is

Michael K said...

My mother made wonderful banana cakes when I was a boy. When I was older and asked for her recipe, she said she had forgotten how to make it.

I'm too fat to eat cake now but I'm working on it.

Annie said...

Back in the day, you would bake and frost your own cake.

We still prefer Duncan Hines to store bought. Great birthday cake for less than $4.


Rana said...

Mark, they still have dry frosting. It's called confectioner's sugar. Softened butter, a little milk, and vanilla. Voila, frosting!

Ann Althouse said...

Confectioner's sugar was the easy way to make icing. With granulated sugar (and a double boiler), you could make 7-minute icing. That was great!

Ignorance is Bliss said...

Wow, I got a tag for that?

It must be my birthday!

J. Farmer said...

Why on earth would anyone consume a "birthday cake," a thing so wretched that most people restrict themselves to eating it perhaps once a year, when they could just as easily have pie or a crisp/crumb/cobbler?

Fran said...

Birthday cake IS a kind of cake. Check out birthday cake ice cream. Delicious.

Patrick said...

I think politifact need to look into Tom Cotton's birthday cake claims.

David Begley said...

Did you read some of the comments?

Cheap suits alleged and much jealous that he got accepted at Harvard. Much hate all around.

Two minutes of hate moved to Cotton from the pizza place.

The Left is insane.

Kirby Olson said...

If a guy goes into a Muslim bakery, and says, depict Allah on a cake, does the Muslim baker have to make the cake?

Batman AZ said...

I prefer to think of it as in "it's 5 o'clock somewhere" as providing a reason to enjoy an adult beverage...just so,everyday is someone's Birthday. (Birthday Cake vodka is also quite nice.)