Goodbye Skymall, and Thanks for All the Automatic Cereal Dispensers

The internet is currently aflutter with horror after learning that beloved in-flight junk-slinging bastion Skymall (it pains us to even link to its website, as it is best enjoyed when two Screwdrivers deep and four hours into a transcontinental journey at 35,000 feet) is in the throes of a bankruptcy crisis, rendering us all panicked about whereforth we will obtain our World's Largest Write-On Maps and Life-Size Anubis Statues.

Over the years, Skymall has debuted and sold countless products that truly felt like they couldn't have found a home anywhere else. Many of them aimed to be incredibly efficient but instead landed in the realm of utter uselessness (for example, this clock that demands you read a complete sentence to know what time it is rather than glance at some numerals); others, such as the infamous Zombie of Montclaire Moors statue, aim to be decorative in a "unique and edgy" sense but translate as "totally fucking weird."

We've come to love Skymall, and now perhaps have lost it—and we can't think of a better way to pay homage to its boundless charm than to revisit some of the most delightful food-related inventions that have appeared in its glossy pages over the years. Let's take a trip down memory lane, into the world of carpeted dog ramps and $85,000 sea crafts painted to look like sharks.

Ah, the Pop-Up Hot Dog Cooker, aka the "Hot Diggity Dogger." There is much that could be said, but it also truly speaks for itself.

Who is the PUHDC for? Someone who eats hot dogs constantly and enthusiastically—maybe several times each day. This person also finds it cumbersome to cook hot dogs in a frying pan, which involves turning on the burner, adding a small amount of oil, and flipping the weiner(s) a couple of times—a Herculian three minutes of effort. The microwave just won't do, either, for the owner of a PUHDC, who desires two hot dogs at once, as they're always trying to integrate more processed meats into their diet. This product is for a true hot dog enthusiast, but one who cannot be bothered to take to the grill or the stovetop. That's why Skymall is the perfect place for the PUHDC. With counter space at a premium, who needs any appliance other than this?

And what kitchen would be complete without the Edge Baking Pan? Everyone knows that the corner pieces in a fresh-baked tray of brownies are so rare, so coveted. Like blood diamonds. Forty dollars is a steal in exchange for eating exclusively edge pieces of home-baked goods for the rest of your life, right? Try to give me a center piece and I'll cut you, LOL!

The AeroGarden Pro 200 is likely no longer available because it became abundantly clear that no one was using it to raise heirloom tomatoes on their kitchen counter, and that it was being sold almost exclusively to amateur home marijuana growers.

Are you anticipating a horrible emergency doomsday scenario wherein you won't have access to any food for three whole days, but you want to ensure that during that time period you'll be feasting on Beef Stroganoff and Sweet 'n' Sour Pork? For $60, you can purchase this 72-Hour Emergency Meal Kit and savor your personal supply of Pasta Primavera and Chili Mac with Beef while blood runs in the streets outside. (For the same price, you could buy enough cans of foods to last a small family for three weeks, and it would likely taste better than chicken teriyaki that has a seven-year shelf life.)

I can just imagine the montage that would lead into the infomercial for the Automatic Cereal Dispenser, with incompetent middle-aged women and stressed children dramatically spilling metric tons of cornflakes all over their kitchen counters and floors. "Pouring cereal straight from the box is near-impossible!" the voiceover would exclaim, followed by a demonstration of how robotic and orderly the Breakfix can make your breakfast routine.

It's also delightful to envision the dispenser malfunctioning and forcefully spraying an entire box of Lucky Charms into the face of a Mommie Dearest.

The Pierogi Ornament solves the eternal dilemma of what to get for your Polish great-aunt for Christmas. But if you'd prefer to bestow it upon an empanada, calzone, or hand pie enthusiast, they probably won't be the wiser. A+ for practicality.

Children will absolutely adore the Automatic Marshmallow Bazooka, because it not only offers them an opportunity to assault you and the family cat with obnoxious pellets while you're trying to nap or watch Storage Wars, but also provides an excuse to buy and stuff their faces with mounds of highly choking-hazardous marshmallows that will probably get mashed into a sticky mess in your expensive Persian carpet or rot forgotten under the couch for years. Thankfully, it can only shoot one mallow every twelve seconds—kind of a poor excuse for a confectionary assault rifle.

And finally, for the gourmand Skymall browser, there is the Lobsterpalooza! Gram Dinner, a grand affair of live animals and "30-inch Chocolate Velvet Cake." For two Benjamins, you get two conscious and surely pain-feeling live Maine lobsters (your choice as to whether to keep them as pets) stuffed in a box with lobster cakes, lobster bisque, lobster ravioli in lobster alfredo sauce, the aforementioned chocolate velvet cake, some oyster crackers and other crap that you'll throw in a drawer, and a FREE lemon. This is the Skymall-ordered feast that dreams are made of.

Honorable Mentions:

This Tortilla Baby Newborn Swaddle Blanket & Hat Set is either an adorable wink at burrito obsession or an entirely perverse and creepy way of reverse-anthropomorphizing your child from a living human into a snack food.

Prepare to be everyone's least favorite person on the N train when you stroll aboard wearing this Pina Colada Scented Womens Tee, which can be smelled from up to six feet away! We are praying for the person who's pressed against your coconutty torso during commute hours and walks out involuntarily reeking of a bad spray tan.

Oh, Skymall. We truly hate to see you go. So long, and thank you dearly for all the WTFs.