Gone Bowling

An undated promotional. I did my best on the year. Check out the lovely wood veneer, the fancy tureens... Right from the start the company is shouting from the rooftops, "We will try way too hard to make you love something that you only buy because it's fast, cheap, and unperishable."

Above: Was this left over from some promo where you could win Wedgewood and silverplate if you sent in a wheelbarrow full of box tops? I hope so. Below, left: "Good Evening, Mr. & Mrs. Smith. Yes, dinner is crap and my gems are plastic. But given what you pay my husband, maybe you should just shut up and eat it."

Above, left: Is Mom using the soup to open Dad's pores, or what? Above, right: I'm backing away slowly from the caricature, not to mention the "Oriental Mood." Gah. Below, left: What Mom's really saying there is, "Mea Culpa, Kids. We can have cheeseburgers from the drive-thru next week. I promise." Below, right: "Those three bacon strips are all the meat we can afford this month, Gents. Sip slowwwwwwly, and remember how much I love you."

Above, left: "The Ravenous Ones"? Is this what George Romero was eating when he decided to launch his film career? Above, right: "Football fans want something that'll 'stick to their ribs.'" Ladle this out just once and those freeloaders will go to somebody else's house on Sundays. Then you can relax and get drunk in peaceful solitude. Below, left: "Trainwreck" and "Aspic" almost rhyme. There's a reason for that. Below, right: Yes, mixing up instant soup and then hauling it to a picnic makes perfect sense. Luckily by this time we're so hypnotized by the colors chosen by Lipton that we'll believe anything.

The Dansk pots are nice, though.

Somehow this product never really took off, did it? Maybe people couldn't see the point of buying mega-salty powdered soup in a can and then adding water. After all, they could already buy moderately salty condensed soup in a can and add water. I believe these pages are from either Life or Look magazine.

A stunning reversal of the usual situation: the total opposite of Sounds good in theory, Looks awful in practice! My hat is off to the food stylist. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't eat any of this, but for a few beats while scanning the picture, I actually did consider it.

I miss the good old days when sofas and airplane seats were interchangeable.

My new food cart will absolutely be called "The Lusty Tomato." From the April issue of The Ladies Home Journal .