coke

    My sister Jenna and I are once again sharing a bed. The nice thing is that it is now a king size bed, since my go-getter of a roommate Gabi got us upgraded for free.

   Yep, we went from a pretty regular two bed hotel room to a pimped out two bedroom suite.

   Which is sweet.  

   So, in Atlanta Coca-Cola is king. Everywhere you look you see that universal red and white lettered swag--on umbrellas, signs, clothes, and of course, cans and bottles.  Anyway, after successfully opening here we decided that next on the agenda was a visit to the World of Coca-Cola.  

  Uh-huh, the world. 

 

  Intense. 

  And not only that, but a bargain, considering when we paid the $15 fee we not only received our admission ticket, we also received a coupon for a free waffle from the Waffle House.  

  Now, we had already planned to go visit this wonderful world, so a free waffle to boot was only the icing on the coke. Er, cake.   

   Right, so here we are, totally chilling with that famously friendly polar bear who is so cool because he drinks coke.

  

  He's also cool because he didn't eat us alive. 

  And he's in commercials. 

  So he's happy because he gets those checks from residuals.

  And a happy polar bear who drinks coke, stars in commercials, and gets paid well generally does not eat people.  

  It was a win-win situation.   

  We wandered around, learning about the beginnings of coca-cola. Apparently, they first brewed the stuff using a copper kettle.
  Um, a copper kettle that you simply cannot pick up. The early coke brewers must have been very strong. Or maybe the World of Coca-Cola was playing a mean trick on me. 

  Next we stopped at the old fashioned soda shop and waited for the waiter to serve us.

  And waited...And...waited...
  Finally we gave up on him altogether and walked ourselves into a room where we could serve ourselves. 64 different flavors of soda from around the world is no joke. We were so excited to find something called Delaware Punch.

  Sure, it wasn't as delicious as something from Delaware really should be--but still, it was interesting.  

  Fact for you: Coca-Cola employees were not allowed to call Coca-Cola coke until 1942. You think before then they had wild parties where they threw that four letter word around like a bunch of crazed and irresponsible teenagers?  You think they thrilled to the way they successfully stuck it to the man every time they said the Word That Shall Not Be Named?  And I bet the police raided those underground gatherings stealthily, listening outside the door with ears pressed close, just waiting to hear the word coke and bam! they were all over the place, making arrests, breaking it up, telling the non-offenders to go home, that all their fun was shut down for the night.  

   Yeah, and I wonder how many past generations of Coca-Cola employees marched for the Freedom to Abbreviate, sacrificed their job security, their popularity, perhaps even their lives to ensure freedom for all.

   I just hope the present employees appreciate what they did. 

   I know I sure do.  

  
   And you probably should, too.