Deja Vu

I knew something seemed familiar earlier this summer when I told you my Diet Coke explosion story. I should have known that I'd told the internet before. Indeed, tonight I stumbled upon my old blog that I updated frequently at the end of high school and in early college, then less frequently as the years passed. One of the last entries details the story you already know well, but as this is my blog, I'm going to let you read it again-- this time, in the words of 20-year-old Amy. Feel free to skip to the TL;DR.

"Speaking of Diet Coke, I have a story for you. Okay, let me start out by saying that Michelle and I scour Athens for cheap Cokes, being the Diet Coke fiends that we are. In any case, last week or so we discovered that Eckerds had 12-packs of Coke four for $6 after a mail-in rebate. So of course we each bought four. Then the next day we found out that Kroger had Cokes five for $10 without having to do any kind of rebate, which is pretty well incredible, so each of us bought five more. So I had all these cases of Coke in my backseat, and gradually I'd carry them up to my apartment when I came home, but they're heavy, so I couldn't get more than two at a time, and I'd often forget to bring any up. So today I was driving, on the phone with David, when all of a sudden I heard a pop and then a fzzzzzzz. And I knew what was up. So I pulled over at a gas station and got out and ran around to the backseat and pulled the two cases that were on the seat out of the car. Only one of them was wet-- and leaking everywhere-- but then I pulled a can out of the other case and it was bloated like they get when you leave them in the freezer for too long-- rotund with the top part puffing up. This doesn't seem like something Cokes can just bounce back from. So I was talking to David, and we decided I should just cut my losses and get rid of the offending cases. Of course the gas station trash cans were the kind with small openings with flaps, and so I had to run each leaking case of Coke over to the trash can where I'd have to wrestle it into the too-small opening. Who knows how crazy everyone must've thought the weird girl shoving cases of Coke into trash cans was. In any case, the moral of the story is I need to go back to Kroger and buy more Cokes."

I think I liked it better the first time I told it. Aren't you supposed to cringe at all your old writing? Well I reread things I've written in the past and am quite pleased with myself. I think my writing has gotten worse as time has progressed-- probably because I'm required to do it less.

In any case, still don't leave Diet Coke in hot cars. That's the true moral of the story. Also, I'm out of Diet Coke-- maybe I'll go check out Eckerds and Kroger tomorrow.

Ticking Time Bombs

Tonight, I got in my car to make an impromptu trip to WalMart before it closed. If you'd like, you can imagine I was heading somewhere much more exciting and fashionable, but really, I was going to WalMart. As I opened the driver's side door, I noticed something small and dark on the passenger seat. "Is that a slug??" I thought. Gross. But as I looked closer, I could see that it wasn't a slug: it was GLASS. That's right, a shard of brown glass. From a beer bottle.

I'd noticed yesterday that there was a bottle of Bud Light on the floor of my car. It had to have rolled out of a half-empty case we were transporting the evening prior, and being in a hurry to get somewhere exciting and fashionable yesterday, I just left it there. Apparently that was a truly terrible idea, because it would seem that sometime during the day today, it exploded. Into many, many shards of beer bottle. And as you can imagine, everything in my car is a little bit sticky now. I almost wish it had been a slug.

Unfortunately, this isn't my first experience with beverages blowing up in hot cars. I recall one summer in college, when I lived alone. Diet Cokes were on sale 5/$12, so naturally I'd loaded up my shopping cart with five 12-packs. But once I got back to the apartment, I couldn't transport five 12-packs of soda up three flights of stairs. Not in one trip, at least, and I have a pig-headed tendency to refuse to make more than one trip, ever. So two cases made it upstairs with the groceries. Later, the next time I came back from somewhere, two more made their way into the apartment. But one lonely 12-pack remained in the backseat.

The following day, I was driving somewhere on a back road. Over the sounds of the radio, I heard a sudden POP, followed by a sizzling kind of sound. Instantly I thought my car had exploded. Once I assured myself that it hadn't, I thought to follow the sound of the sizzling to the backseat, where multiple Diet Cokes inside the case have bloated and exploded. They were leaking and spurting soda everywhere. Fortunately there was a gas station up ahead, so I pulled into the lot and wrestled the offending object out of my car. Most of the cans inside had hulked out such that the cardboard was ripped and mangled in places, and I could tell that the precious Diet Coke was beyond saving. Also, it was still dripping all over me. The only trash can in sight was one of those small ones with an ash tray top and a small space below for trash, so cramming the case inside was a bit of a challenge. But I laugh in the face of challenges, and thus succeeded. Finally, the rogue Diet Cokes were put to rest for good.

The moral of these stories? Dogs and babies aren't the only things you shouldn't leave in hot cars. Think of the beverages.