If you love it so much, why don’t you marry it?
Dear Coca-Cola factory people,
I’ve been a Diet Coke addict for about six years now. I’ve started and stopped. I’ve stopped and stayed stopped for a while. But the truth is, I like my Diet Coke.
I like the fizzy, refreshing taste. I like the way the can feels in my hand. I like the way cans are the perfect size for the side pocket on my backpack. I like the way people in the newsroom bribe me with Diet Coke. I like that I have one of the rare can-dispensing vending machines at work (bottles just aren’t the same).
What I do not like is when you people change things on me.
This week, when I got to work on Thursday, I bought a can to drink with my lunch. It was a can like all other Diet Coke cans.
But an hour and a half later, I got thirsty again. I wanted more. So I went back to my vending machine and I bought another. As I walked back to the newsroom, I opened the can without even looking down at it.
Something was wrong. Something was different. That pull tab did not feel like the pull tab of a Diet Coke can.
I looked down, noticing the slightly more rounded tab, the wider hole, the completely different shape of the can’s top. It was Diet Coke can, but it was weird.
Everyone else in the newsroom thought I was weird for even noticing.
I was initially suspicious, but the contents still tasted like Diet Coke and it didn’t kill me. But I’m hoping the whole switch was merely an accident, that only this particular batch of cans was different from the rest. Because this will continue to bother me until the cans go back to normal.
Please quit putting the wrong tops on my Diet Coke cans. I realize the new pull tabs are easier to lift, but they are just not right? I know you think just not right is no justification, but it’s the same rationale America uses to dismiss things like socialized health care and marmite, so obviously it should work for this, too, right?
Yours addictedly,
Katie
You like Marmite?
I knew you were wonderful, Katie!!!
Comment by Raymond — 1/30/2005 @ 5:26 pm
Actually, it’s a taste I haven’t yet acquired. Maybe someday.
Comment by Katie — 1/30/2005 @ 6:00 pm
I didn’t think Coke used the wide-mouthed holes on any of their drinks other than Surge, which has SADLY been gone for several years now. I still haven’t stoped crying.
Comment by Joshua — 1/31/2005 @ 3:59 am
Yes! It was the same can tops as the Surge cans. Maybe they had a years-old surplus of Surge can tops that they needed to get rid of, so they put them on my Diet Coke.
I never developed much of a Surge habit. I do remember drinking a few cans when they were giving it away at my seventh grade dance.
Comment by Katie — 2/1/2005 @ 12:27 am
i like drinking diet coke every now and then, but it’s very bad for your teeth even though it’s sugar free. i am the kind of person who would notice such changes though, so i know what you mean! in college they changed my favourite yogurt and i believe i was the only person to notice, but i didn’t like it anymore! you might have to realise that this change is here to stay, as difficult as that might be. at least they have only changed the design of the can, with my yogurt they changed the taste!
Comment by mae — 2/1/2005 @ 3:46 am
“Habit” is an appropriate word for it. When Surge first came out, they were selling it at a six pack for a dollar. They came to my school too. I remember that they were givbing away a bunch of cans, and they had these Sweet green Surge jackets on. Those things were awesome.
Comment by Joshua — 2/4/2005 @ 8:18 pm
Heh, Surge. I’m surprised you’re of the “can” camp in the can VS bottle diet coke debate. I myself am a bottle fiend. If I can only purchase diet coke in a can, say at school, then I just grit my teeth, go without the coke, and miss all content presented in my classes as I think about the sweet sweet crispness of an ice cold aspartame enhanced beverage. This is because cans have 3 major drawbacks: 1. a slightly tinny taste, 2. they are completely unportable! I’m a gal on the move, i need to be able to CLOSE the coke and throw it in my bag and 3. that persistent urban legend about mice shitting on the cans as they sit in storage… and then you put your mouth on it. eww. However, at home, I do drink out of cans because I can pour it into a glass with ice. (which pretty much flies in the face of points 1 and 3, but whatever) In addition, cans don’t have the cool ‘under the cap’ contests. I have a question regarding this: in the US, it is customary, right, that ‘under the cap’ means that you open the bottle, and look inside the lid? You do not have to physically remove that little plastic thing inside the lid? My reputation is riding on this.
On other business, hope you’re doing good! :D
Comment by molly — 2/6/2005 @ 9:35 pm
Molly > You’re right. You just look at the underside of the lid.
However, there are some small exceptions. If you do the “no purchase necessary”-style entry and mail off for a free cap, they just send you the plastic disc that would go in a cap. And if you win the big jackpot prize, I think you’re supposed to take the thing out so you can fit it into a flat envelope to mail it off (although now a lot of them are codes you submit on their website). But if you just win another free Coke, you can take the cap to the store and just trade it for a new one (the people at the store mail it in then to get their money back).
I, uh, read all the fine print one time. I was bored.
As for 1, 2, and 3: I’m trained to like the tinny taste, I sit on my ass enough that portability isn’t a big problem, and the mouse poop hasn’t killed me yet.
Comment by Katie — 2/6/2005 @ 10:00 pm
I seem to remember having to take the plastic thing on the lid off, but that was a Long, Long time ago, when we were kids. Am I totally off on this? Remember, back when the bottoms of 2-litres were those hard plastic “butt-lids” that fit over the knobs now are that now make up the bottom of the bottle.
Comment by Joshua — 2/7/2005 @ 4:35 am
Hee! Butt lids! Yeah, what exactly was the point of those?
Maybe the plastic things DID have to come out back in the day. I wasn’t much of a soda drinker back then.
Comment by Katie — 2/7/2005 @ 8:32 am
Well, folks - in Canada, you have to take the plastic thingy out! In France too. I kept thinking that I just hadn’t won, but then someone pointed out that you have to take out the plastic bit and look on the underside of THAT. However, I do not think that is the meaning of “look under the cap.” Good. Glad to know I’m not going insane. On a related topic, I looked under the cap (read: under the plastic bit!) on a pepsi bottle in France, and instead of “Please try again” it said “Thanks for trying.” How sweet! It’s like a participation ribbon at a race for all the kids who weren’t first.
Comment by molly — 2/7/2005 @ 2:11 pm