1. Having to purée bananas by shoving them through a tiny handheld sieve a tablespoon at a time really sucks. The tamis that's on my gift wishlist is getting bumped up in priority.
2. Even if you manage to remember all the ingredients for the nifty new cupcake recipe you're making for the first time, and all the ingredients for the icing you'll be using as well, forgetting that you've run out of cupcake liners still means a late-night run to the 24-hour grocery store.

I'm not a kitchen "gadget freak". I shun gimmicky single-purpose kitchen gadgets like cupcake irons, garlic presses, melon ballers, grapefruit knives, milk frothers, the much-pilloried Slap Chop™, and anything that sits in a "junk" cupboard and only comes out once a year. That being said, there are a number of genuinely useful, versatile tools that I get a lot of mileage out of but rarely see other people using. These things are all inexpensive and most serve multiple purposes. Take a look and let me know what you think.