The list of unitaskers available for your computer’s USB ports just got a little bit longer thanks to the extremely necessary USB-powered Hamster Wheel:

Now, you can waste away electrical energy by simply plugging in this “pet” to your computer. And, it’s not just a form of entertainment, it makes a political statement by telling your boss that you believe your work is like a hamster in a wheel, going nowhere. Wow, it’s not a unitasker after all!

Unfortunately, it doesn’t appear that the Hamster Wheel is currently being sold in the U.S. Those of us in the states will simply have to settle for the AAA battery version. (A version, I might add, that specifically claims it is NOT safe for children.)

Thanks to reader Enestor19 for bringing this unitasker to our attention.

Reader Bri had me laughing aloud when I followed her link to this week’s unitasker. Just watch the failed attempts to crack an egg in the advertisement for the EZ Cracker. Seriously, who has this much trouble cracking an egg? And who tries to crack open an egg with a FORK?!

I also love that when you order the EZ Cracker you get not one, but two unitaskers with the bonus Bacon Wave. Truly fantastic.

I have to admit, though, that the EZ Cracker device looks a bit more useful than the last one we featured: The Egg Cracker. However, both devices are still completely useless once you master the simple skill of cracking an egg.

This item was sent to us by many Unclutterer readers, and I specifically liked the humor expressed by those who sent it to us over Twitter. Today’s unitasker is the TwitterPeek:

For $100, you can get this mobile device that ONLY checks Twitter. Sure, you could check Twitter on your smart phone or have it push text messages to your regular cell phone, which you already carry, but why do that when you could buy this additional device? How much fun is only carrying your wallet and phone in your pocket? It’s no fun at all! You want to carry more More MORE stuff around with you!

I also must admit to laughing at the title of the review of the device on PC World, aptly named “TwitterPeek: The Twitter-Only Gadget Destined for Extinction.”

I think that this week’s unitasker may actually be a non-tasker. Ever since reader Penni sent this Egg Cuber to me, I have tried to imagine why someone would want square eggs — and I have yet to come up with a reason.

Does the oval offend some people? Do square eggs have a longer shelf life? Is it easier to crack a square egg than it is to crack an oval one? Is there a major problem with eggs rolling off counters and trays that I don’t yet know about? why? Why? WHY would anyone want a square egg?!

Also, I think you have to own chickens or at least have access to immediately laid eggs to be able to take advantage of this device. Egg shells are only transformable for a very short time period after being laid. It seems like quite the task to be able to even get these to work.

Please leave your explanations (the more humorous the better) for why someone might need the Egg Cuber in the comments. There must be some reason for such a device beyond the end result just looking cool.

(Image via The Kitchen Store)

I want to start with the obvious, and that is the name of this product. Most multi-tasking or high-utility kitchen products have simple names that begin with lowercase letters: skillet, oven, knife, plate. A good sign that something might be a unitasker is when its name is cutesy and trademarked: JerkyXpress, Plater Grater, Nostalgia Cotton Candy Maker. By all accounts, the Chef’n Garlic Zoom is destined for unitasker greatness based on the fact that it includes a random apostrophe and the word zoom:

It looks innocent enough, yes? It’s not very large and wouldn’t clutter up your kitchen too much. And, it probably even works (although the reviews on Amazon aren’t what I would call “glowing”). However, I fail to see how it is better than a KNIFE, which you probably already own. Here’s how you use it:

1. Peel skin off garlic clove. (Which, I think most people do with a knife.)
2. Open Chef’n Garlic Zoom and put in your clove of garlic.
   
3. Close up the device and roll it along the counter.
   
4. Open it.
   
5. Remove the center blade.
   
6. Use your finger or a small spoon to scoop out the garlic. (Anyone else guessing that getting the garlic out is a bit messy?)
   

How is this easier than chopping up garlic with a knife? When you use a knife, all you do is peel the garlic and chop it up. You can even rinse off the knife and use it on a carrot! or broccoli! or fish! I almost feel sorry for the little Chef’n Garlic Zoom. Almost. Thanks to reader Gabe for finding us this adorable unitasker.

It is rare that I am at a loss for words, but this week’s unitasker has changed that:

Thank you, reader Kimberly, for introducing me to what may be the most unitaskery unitasker of all time: the onion ring holder.

This week’s unitasker comes to us from reader Debra. For just $15, you can own the Microwave Popcorn Storage Dispenser and have a container to hold your unpopped bags of popcorn — just like the box the popcorn bags are sold in:

With a footprint of 7.5″ x 6.5″ you can sacrifice a good portion of your kitchen counter space for this quaint device! Sure, when you store your microwave popcorn bags in the box they came in inside your pantry you sacrifice no counter space whatsoever — but we shouldn’t think about that. Ignore the obvious! Buy a Microwave Popcorn Dispenser today!

I’m still of the opinion that the game Rochambeau is unclutter-wonderful because it requires no equipment. If you have hands, you can play Rock, Paper, or Scissors whenever you want. You can even play it alone if you have two hands.

So, you can understand my confusion when I stumbled upon yet another unitasker related to this game. Thanks to reader Nise, we now know about the Rock, Paper, Scissors Card Game:

First, you need hands to be able to deal, hold, and play the cards. Hands that you could simply use to PLAY THE GAME. Second, you — wait, forget a second point. I think the first point about HANDS says it all.

We believed the Butter Cutter was quite the ridiculous unitasker when we featured it back in October of 2007. Little did we know that there were even larger and messier competitors in the non-knife butter cutting market. Behold the Gourmet Butter Mate and the One Click Butter Cutter:

I am 100 percent serious when I say that I don’t understand why someone would prefer to use one of these devices instead of a knife. A knife is relatively small, dishwasher safe, and can be used to cut hundreds upon hundreds of things. Neither of these devices can be used to cut anything other than butter and they’re huge and made up of many plastic parts and complete overkill and … well, you get the picture.

In comparison, these two devices make the original Butter Cutter we featured feel much less like a unitasker.

A game of Hot Potato plays like this: Someone walks to the kitchen and grabs a potato. This person then tosses the potato to a friend. That friend tosses the potato to someone else. The potato is thrown around a group of friends until someone drops the potato. The person who dropped the potato is “out” and the game continues until only one person is left standing. The winner is named the “Hot Potato.”

The game is simple, straightforward, and fun for young children who are learning to throw and catch. You can even clean up the potato and use it later that day in a meal. This is not a game that I thought needed any improvement … but, apparently, I was wrong:

Now you can buy a music playing, batteries required, painted toy to substitute for nature’s fun: The Hot Potato!

The baby industry is overflowing with unnecessary stuff, and I’ve recently found what may be the king of all baby-related unitaskers. Introducing the Itzbeen:

It’s called the Itzbeen because it is a timer that tracks how long it has been since you last fed, changed, or put your child down for a nap. You know, in case your screaming live human infant isn’t a clue that you are neglecting him, or if it isn’t extremely obvious that the breathing lump of flesh next to you is your napping child.

Granted, in a slightly sleep-deprived state, you might accidentally refer to your child by your pet’s name (I’ve definitely done this over the past two weeks), but things like feedings don’t slip though the cracks — your child makes sure of that. And, if you’re so sleep deprived that you don’t remember feeding your child, you shouldn’t be alone with your baby. Hire a babysitter for a few hours instead of thinking this device will be the solution.

Heck, if it’s really difficult to remember when you recently fed your child, you could just write it down.

The following statement from the product description made me laugh aloud:

Wonderful tool to help first-time parents learn the basic needs of a baby.

What?! Are they serious? Do they believe that there are first-time parents out there who are savvy enough to figure out how to use this device but somehow don’t know how to meet their child’s most basic needs?? Hysterical.

The Itzbeen is clutteriffic on so many levels.

It’s the Thumbthing! It does the same thing your thumb does, but with thin pink plastic!

Instead of bending your thumb so that the knuckle rests on the right-hand page and the tip of your thumb rests on the left-hand page (or vice versa if you’re left handed), now you just stick the Thumbthing on your thumb and it does the tedious work for you!

(Anyone else thinking Daffy Duck would be the perfect spokesduck for this product? No? Just me?)

The product’s FAQ page tells us all we need to know about the Thumbthing:

What is so great about the Thumbthing?
There is nothing else like it, it is beautifully designed, and it is so simple to use. It fits neatly onto your THUMB like a ring and does not clip onto the book at all! This means turning the page is as simple as ever. And of course it makes reading more comfortable and much much cooler!

That’s right, “much much cooler.” Thanks to reader Pippi for tipping us on to this week’s awesome unitasker.

In your home, you probably have an upright or canister vacuum that you use on your floors. Maybe you also have a Roomba and a DustBuster to clean up smaller messes. Now is the time to add to your cornucopia of vacuums and get the Extreme Bug Vacuum:

If only there were clutter vacuums to suck up the absurd bug vacuum!

So you have a lemon, and you only want to use half of it? Wow. Now that is a conundrum. If you only use half a lemon, what will you possibly do with the other half? Sure, you could squeeze the juice out of it and put the juice in a bottle or you could put the lemon cut-side down in a multi-purpose container with a lid — but where is the fun in these solutions? There isn’t any. Those options aren’t fun at all. They don’t make you laugh at how incredibly specific and rarely useful they are like you would if you owned a Lem-O Saver:

But why stop at just ONE very specific produce saving device? You can also buy the Avocado, Onion, Garlic, Cucumber, Apple, Banana, and Tomato Savers! Fill all your cupboards with these extremely specific food storage containers!!

I’m not sure which large site wrote about this behemoth of a unitasker, but one of the big players must have written about it because I received an enormous number of nominations for it this week.

Introducing, the Chef Stack Pancake Maker:

It makes pancakes, pancakes, and only pancakes!

Huh. Now I’m craving pancakes.

(The first to nominate this beauty were professional organizer Gail Gray and Chris from Austin.)

Turning a cooler upside down to dry after washing it is so 2008. This is 2009, and you need Cooler Dry:

Sure, you could just flip the cooler’s top open if turning it upside down isn’t your style, but if you did that then you wouldn’t get to buy this unitasker!

Thanks to reader Longstride for introducing us to the Cooler Dry! I got a hearty laugh out of this product, which was a great birthday present.

Are you capable of baking brownies, but haven’t yet figured out how to use a knife? I understand. Electric mixers, rubber spatulas, and cracking eggs are easy, but cutting with a knife is unbelievably difficult! Lucky for you, there is now Perfect Brownie — the non-stick baking pan frame, pop-out bottom tray, metal slats, and metal slats guide to do the work for you!

Not convinced? Maybe this video will help:

Oh, hey, it’s my birthday, so you’re getting two Unitasker Wednesday posts today. My gift to you! And thanks to reader Sstasi for passing along this fabulous unitasker to us.

When I’ve had the unfortunate experience of having my freezer break on me, I’ve simply noticed the smell of rotting food and ice cube trays filled with water to tell me that such a tragedy has taken place. I was unaware that in addition to this effective method of identifying a broken freezer, I also could have had a device tell me the exact same thing! Introducing the Frozen Food Safety Monitor:

Yes, the Frozen Food Safety Monitor tells you when your freezer is no longer working based on a complicated series of colorful liquids. When the colorful liquids are in the bottom of the device and not the top of it, then your freezer is no longer working! So, in addition to having rotten food, you also have a monitor to tell you that your food is rotten — how about that! Rotten food and a monitor. Fantastic!

(Seriously, if the device could somehow make a beeping noise or posses some way to alert you before your food went bad, well, that might have some sort of a purpose. Would it really be all that difficult to fashion a sensor, alarm, and battery to this contraption to give it an alarm?? Sigh.)

Thanks to reader Bluenewts for introducing us to the gem.

I’m taking a bit of a detour today from our regular Unitasker Wednesday format and featuring a group of fake products. The Onion, the leader in spoof newspapers, has nine new “items” in their online store and they’re all from the imaginary Yu Wan Mei company.

My favorite item is the Device:

From the product description:

The device has been completed and is now available for sale. Code 41-Virtue-00B.

Oh how I love devices for sale!

Another favorite is Miscellaneous Flavor Paste:

From its product description:

Any meal or food can be a better meal with the magic touch of the Miscellaneous Flavor Paste spread on it! It is strongly recommended that you buy two, because of the compelling power of this product.

Be sure to check out all nine of these gems for a good laugh.

I’m of the opinion that if someone knows how to bake homemade bread that they’re suave enough to be able to slice it. If getting a consistent width for each slice of bread is important to that person, I also think that they are capable of setting a ruler next to a cutting board and achieving this result.

So, you can imagine my confusion when I learned about the Norpro Bread Slicer with Crumb Catcher.

Who is using this device? Isn’t part of the fun of having homemade bread that you get to cut off whatever size you want? If slicing bread were difficult for you, wouldn’t you just buy pre-sliced bread from your bakery or grocery store?

Also, I’m a little confused about this “crumb catcher” aspect of the device. Does it just let the crumbs drop down into the crevices of the wood? If so, how is that different than a regular cutting board that the crumbs sit on? Don’t you still have to clean up the crumbs? Wouldn’t digging the crumbs out of these little slats be annoying? I’m truly baffled by this kitchen gadget.