Types of Soft Drink
COLA
So just what the hell is cola, anyway? According to my best friend, Wikipedia, cola's name (and caffeine content) comes from the kola nut, its color comes from caramel and its flavor comes from a mixture of vanilla, cinammon and citrus flavorings. Um...okay. That's kind of helpful, I guess. Cola may just be the weirdest thing on the planet -- it used to have cocaine in it and was originally marketed as a hangover cure (and Wikipedia didn't even tell me that, the bastard). It's just such a strange concoction of weird stuff. And yet, somehow, it's delicious. Except for RC. That's not delicious. Plus 6 bullets.
DIET COLA
I've heard people say that they can't tell the difference between regular cola and diet, but it's my contention that those people do not have taste buds, because diet cola tastes like shit. Utter, horrible shit. There is really nothing worse than fake sugar when it comes to taste -- it fools you for a second into thinking it's real sugar, and then -- blaagh! -- you get that rush of aftertaste that's like someone dumped a shovelful of sand in your mouth. And another thing, for those of you that don't know. If you want to stop being fat, diet cola's not going to do it for you. Lay off the Big Macs already. Really, the only acceptable diet soda I can think of is that C2 stuff Coke came out with a couple years ago (and I don't think they make it anymore) that had like, half the sugar. At least it tasted vaguely like Coke. As I was heard to say several times, "If I was a fat girl, I'd drink it." Minus 5 bullets.
LEMON-LIME DRINKS
Here's the thing. These don't taste good. At all. If anybody even attempts to tell you that they drink Mountain Dew or Mello Yello (which no one drinks anyway) for the taste, punch them right in their damned mouth, because they're liars. But the stuff is loaded with caffeine, and is actually preferable to the even more horrid taste of those godawful energy drinks. So if you've got to stay up all night writing a paper or pull a long day at the office or fight a cougar or something, you pretty much have to slam a Dew. Better yet, you could drink a soft drink that's only available where I'm from in the Carolinas, Sun Drop, which corrodes and melts your insides. That way, you don't have to worry about ever having to work again. 0 bullets.
SPRITE/7-UP/SIERRA MIST
I can't even think of a catch-all name for these, except for maybe "wimp sodas." Really, if I wanted to drink something bland and without caffeine in it, I'd drink fucking water. An interesting tidbit I found on Wikipedia, however: "Sprite is also the favoured drink of fans of the hardcore punk rock genre, especially those of the straight edge persausion." To which my response is: HAhahAHAhahAHha! Losers (or maybe Lousers?). Sprite is really good for one thing, which is mixing with vodka. And that's only because drinking vodka right out of the bottle is considered "taboo" by "society." Stupid society. I will say that at least these drinks are one step above Fresca, the wimpiest thing ever, which I won't even dignify with its own section in this piece. Minus 2 bullets.
DR PEPPER/MR. PIBB/ETC.
Let me say that there's nothing wrong with liking Dr Pepper per se, and that there are plenty of fine, upstanding people who drink it. But I've just got to say this. Anybody whose favorite soft drink is Dr Pepper? They are a weird person. I have never met anyone whose favorite soda was Dr Pepper and that wasn't weird. Not like, lovably weird either. I mean, keeps heads in their refrigerator weird. And I'll have you know my life experience is one of the best scientific measures known to man. So you're just going to have to deal with it. Personally, I never really saw the appeal of these drinks -- I always thought it just tasted like somebody dumped ground-up ginger into Coke -- but that could have something to do with my wanting to avoid becoming a part of the demented Dr Pepper world. Minus 3 bullets.
ORANGE SODA
To provide further proof that my life is fucking pathetic, I once considered myself a connoisseur of orange sodas. Of course you have your Sunkists and your Slices and your Fantas, all of which are good in their own right, but the real glory, I thought, lay in those generic, store-brand orange sodas you can get for a quarter from the machine outside the store. I got to the point where I knew which store brands were superior to others, which were sweeter than others, and even which of the name-brands they tried to emulate (everybody was trying to go after Sunkist, which is pretty understandable). I kind of burned out on the stuff pretty quickly, though, especially after I discovered that kind that comes in the glass bottles and tastes like a creamsicle. That's the hot shit. So, I guess the moral of my story is...I dunno...orange soda is pretty good? I guess that's it. Plus 3 bullets.
If your favorite soft drink is Dr Pepper and you have an overwhelming urge to put my head in your refrigerator, send me an e-mail. I know some good people who can get you the help you need.
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