I was given the gift of love in the form of a SpongeBob Sno-cone maker and, since I am cheap, I decided to review it for your pleasure. I know a lot of you are pinning your hopes and dreams this Christmas season on the SpongeBob Sno-cone maker and I want to give you an in-depth look at this product. Plus, I was hungry for Sno-cones and baby seal pelts, but I guess a cherry sno-cone will have to do for the time being.

I think it is a great idea to mix a toy with eating. I mean if there is one thing we need to instill in our children at a young age it is: eating + toy = true happiness. I am a proud supporter of all things edible and fun like that EZ Bake Oven, Gummi Rats, and the mystery gum underneath the bleachers at high school basketball games.

The SpongeBob Sno-cone maker can thank its predecessor The Peanuts/Snoopy Sno-Cone maker for the concept of getting a cartoon tie in with a treat dispenser. What sort of children don't like Sno-cones? I'll tell you what children...the ones in Korea who had to assemble my Sno-cone maker and were paid in celery. Those little bastards sure do hate celery and fat american children who eat sno-cones.

Packaged in the neon green hue that Nickelodeon has made its own via the slime on "You Can't Do That On Television", the box asserts it is "easy to do!", but the children's faces on the box paint a different story of what is about to unfold. Their anguish looks like that of someone who has witnessed a giraffe stick it's head in a gasoline powered wood-chipper. I feel your pain children, but lets move forward with this article so I can go watch the Ghost Hunters marathon on the Sci-Fi channel.

After I dumped the contents of the box on my floor I began looking at the instructions on exactly how I construct this ice-shredder of doom. I also noted the lack of extra paper cups Nickelodeon had packaged with my toy. I received 6 total, which means after I play "dentist" and give my "patient" a spit cup I am down to 5. How the hell am I supposed to build a Fortune 500 Sno-Cone monopoly with only 5 cups?! It looks like inflation is in my customers' future. Plus, seeing how clean my house is I would also say a case of food poisoning.

After my dreams of a sno-cone monopoly were crushed I took the time to assemble the toy. Overall I was pretty impressed with what I had accomplished. I hadn't lost more than one pint of blood and my creation very much resembled that on the packaging. I also took the extra step to cut out SpongeBob's pineapple house from the box and stick it on the contraption. For my readers I go the extra mile and it shows!

Looks can be deceiving though, as illustrated above. What I expected to be a complete back on the toy was really only a hollow shell. The sno-cone flavoring bottle barely teeters on the edge wanting to fall off most of the time because there simply isn't room to stabilize it. You can also see the brown handle of icy death waiting to crush the lives of any ice-cube unwittingly to fall in its clutches. Oh, it is a sinister sinister handle!

I ran to the kitchen to gather the supplies to make my magical tasty sno-cone and found the ingredients to be quite shocking. I was to mix 1 cup of sugar to 1/2 cup of water and the kool-aid pack. If your kid didn't have diabetes before this toy he sure as hell will when he is done playing. That is what every kid wants...Walter Brimley as a role model.

Before I began mixing I laid the raw material before my monolith as a form of sacrifice. SpongeBob looked down at them with malicious glee and commanded that I begin the satanic formula before his very eyes. I mixed with such fervor you would have thought I was half the weight I currently am.

SpongeBob beckoned to sacrifice a fresh ice cube by placing it in his head. I felt like the evil priest off Beast Master, who tossed the children down the oven, as I flung the ice cube to its gruesome fate and giggled with glee as I smashed it to death with SpongeBob's hat. Grasping the brown handle of death I began cranking and slowly I began to see the crushed remains of my icy cold friend emerge from SpongeBob's mouth.

After working for about 37 hours straight I finally had about enough crushed ice to make my first sno-cone. I trembled with excitement as each particle of icy goodness fell into the cup. I knew soon I would be savoring my first sno-cone while spinning in a circle on my BMX bike as Send Me An Angel played in the background and a spotlight shined down from above illuminating me in my moment of triumph.

I slowly poured the red sugary concoction I labeled "Blood of a Virgin Dove" onto the crushed ice and watched as its pristine white glow suddenly soured with red death. I could almost taste the excitement in my mouth and then I noticed I had bitten off my own tongue in the ice crushing melee.

I thrust the oddly coral shaped spoon antler into my sno-cone mix and pulled a scoop of flavored sex from the paper cup. As the sno-cone hit my mouth I could feel my glucose levels surge to near fatal levels. I let out a belt of maniacal laughter as I consumed the rest of the cup with as much speed as my fat limbs could muster. I slumped into a coma as the brain freeze hit my skull and woke up 12 days later craving more SpongeBob Sno-cones.

It should be noted that as you shave the ice in the sno-cone maker it sounds like the third antichrist has risen and is laying waste to civilization. So loud was this sound that one of my cats was trying to figure out what the hell I was actually trying to accomplish. I think I actually broke out into a sweat after my second sno-cone because it takes about 3-4 ice cubes to make a cup and they sure as hell don't shave themselves. My arm is still pretty sore from "speed shaving" the ice as fast as I possibly could. Speed shaving...a new Olympic sport.

Overall I would say the SpongeBob Sno-Cone maker kicks ass. Anytime you can make SpongeBob look like he is vomiting blood it is an A+ in my book and anytime it is edible vomit you get an extra +. The sno-cones taste good even if they throw you into a diabetic coma and I probably burnt some calories feverishly cranking the handle like a whale on a feeding frenzy in a brine shrimp colony. Plus the whole toy was FREE and nothing gets better than a free cartoon themed treat maker...well maybe Walter Brimley in a 50's style bathing suit and a swim cap making kissy faces while slathering his genitalia in Vick's Vapo-rub.

-LaVarious
11-27-04