�I feel creative,� you say, resolving to combine these two items. The fruit cake mix smells a little like perfume. You eat some. It tastes like chewable multi-vitamins soaked in lemon juice.

�This will be great in chocolate cake!� you manage to convince yourself.

Reading the back of the cake mix box, you search for all the things you�ll need. This takes forty-five minutes because your kitchen is a mess. You do have oil and eggs and a cake pan and a mixing bowl and a measuring cup, which you were beginning to doubt.

The phone rings. You rush to answer it, dropping your glass measuring cup on your tile floor. You start to say �hello,� but are interrupted by a prerecorded telemarketer saying, �Don�t hang up....� You hang up.

You pick up your measuring cup, which now has a large piece broken out of one side. Throwing it away, you decide to measure with a coffee mug. You pick out your biggest mixing bowl and dump in the cake mix and approximate amounts of oil and water.

Now it is time for the eggs. The instructions call for three eggs, and you think how lucky you are that there are exactly three left. You drop one on your tile floor.

�Three eggs would make it too fluffy, anyway,� you tell yourself, and break the remaining two eggs into the bowl. You get your fingers messy and drop one eggshell into the batter. While trying to fish it out, you drop your spoon in after it. You pick both items out with your already sticky fingers and then wash your hands.

You get a clean spoon and try to stir in two handfuls of fruit cake mix. Your right arm starts to ache, so you stir with your left. When your left arm aches, you stop stirring. It is still the lumpiest cake batter you have ever seen.

You set your oven to something close to the recommended temperature. It�s hard to read the little dial, but it must be within fifty degrees of what you intended. You scoop the mixture into the cake pan and put it into the oven. When you step back, you put your foot on the forgotten egg. You wipe the egg off your tile floor, take your shoes off, and then wash your hands again.

You sit down and stare at the clock for half an hour, opening the oven door every five minutes to peer at your conglomeration. Just when you decide that it is almost done, the phone rings again. You spend the next seven minutes trying to convince a person with an unfamiliar accent that you don�t need another credit card.

The smoke alarm goes off. At least that gets rid of the telemarketer. You dash to turn off the oven and then wave your hand in front of the alarm. When that has no effect, you take the smoke alarm off the wall and wave it back and forth. You drop it on your tile floor. The battery is knocked out and rolls under your refrigerator, at last silencing the alarm.

Now you can check your cake. It looks just fine, as far as you can tell, but the casserole you spilled last week is burned black. You can�t find an oven mitt, so you wrap your hands in paper towels and take your cake out of the oven.

You wait impatiently for twenty minutes before cutting and eating a piece of your chocolate fruit cake. Each slice falls in two parts as soon as you lift it out of the pan. The top half is plain chocolate cake, because the fruit cake mix has settled to the bottom. The bottom half is crumbly and tastes slightly bitter, but you persuade yourself that you like it.

When your sister comes home, you talk her into trying it.

�It�s chocolate fruit cake,� you announce proudly. �I like it.�

You fail to convince her. Your parents won�t taste your cake more than once, either. After a while, you stop eating it yourself. There is still half of the cake left. It sits on your table until you have nearly forgotten it.

Two weeks later, you walk into your kitchen, notice the chocolate fruit cake, and throw it away.